


the star to every wand’ring bark

by niennathegrey



Series: it's a (space) fairytale [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Pirate, Angst and Fluff and Smut, Angst with a Happy Ending, Beauty and the Beast Elements, Ben Solo Needs A Hug, Canon-Typical Child Abandonment, Dreams and Nightmares, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Eventual Happy Ending, Eventual Smut, F/M, Fairy Tale Elements, Falling In Love, First Time, Hurt/Comfort, Literary References & Allusions, Loss of Virginity, Magic, Mutual Pining, No Pregnancy, Oral Sex, Rey Needs A Hug, Unprotected Sex, Vaginal Sex, Virgin Ben Solo, Virgin Rey (Star Wars)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-24
Updated: 2021-01-30
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:14:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 38,638
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27031021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/niennathegrey/pseuds/niennathegrey
Summary: “TheSilencer?”Rey exclaimed. “But— but it’s just a myth, an old sailor’s tale.”Kylo arched an eyebrow, a corner of his mouth twitching. “I’m quite real, I assure you.”She lifted her chin stubbornly, willing herself not to blush.“Who are you?”“No one.”🌀This is a story of royalty, pirates, and sailing ships.This is a story of magic, bravery, and—above all things—love.This is the story of a lost, enchanted boy, and of a girl daring enough to defy the gods.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Series: it's a (space) fairytale [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2122413
Comments: 109
Kudos: 261
Collections: To Rapture the Earth and the Seas: the 2020 Reylo Fanfiction Anthology





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! This is my entry to the 2020 Reylo Fanfiction Anthology: To Rapture the Earth and the Seas, for the theme "rough seas." Thank you to the mods for all your hard work, and especially to [crossingwinter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/crossingwinter/pseuds/crossingwinter) (who also made the moodboard (the first image) for this fic ❤️) and [Vivien](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vivien/pseuds/Vivien) for workshopping (and complimenting) my piece. 😊 
> 
> This fic would not have been possible without my talented, patient, and all-around wonderful alpha and beta readers: [Erulisse17](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Erulisse17/pseuds/Erulisse17) (whose moodboard (the second image) first gave me the idea for this story way, _way_ back in March), [Everren](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Everren/pseuds/Everren), [Magpie-trove](https://magpie-trove.tumblr.com/), and [flypaper_brain](https://archiveofourown.org/users/flypaper_brain/pseuds/flypaper_brain). Thank you all SO MUCH for your helpful suggestions, for your enthusiasm for the fic when I was afraid it wasn't worth anything, and for being such good friends. ❤️
> 
> This story is complete, and new chapters will be posted every ~~Friday~~ weekend (anytime between Friday and Monday). I hope you enjoy it! 

“Ren! He’s getting away!” 

He nearly turned in the direction of the shout, but to do so would have been to risk decapitation by the red-armored demon’s blade. He ducked underneath his opponent’s swing and lunged forward, slamming an elbow into the rigid plates covering its gut. The demon grunted in pain and staggered. It was a small opening, but it was enough. 

With a savage upward slash of his broadsword, Kylo Ren cleaved the demon in half from groin to neck. 

As the twitching halves fell, Kylo glanced around. Lightning flashed and thunder roared. The black sea heaved and roiled—yet the _Silencer_ neither pitched nor rolled in the towering waves, only rocked gently from side to side. 

The deck of the ship was chaos. The black-clad Knights of Ren—six in all—fought against Snoke’s red-armored guard demons, the battle looking for all the world like some great, bloody chess game. But it was infinitely more terrifying, for the storm that rocked the sea and the sky around them was happening on the deck too. Here, Ap’lek, red hair bright amid the gloom, whirled and swung her axe at a demon as a funnel cloud formed to scoop up another one behind her. There, Cato raised his arms, and a column of black water rose from the sea and slammed full force onto another demon.

The Knights were efficient at their work, that much was clear. His prey, however, was nowhere to be seen—

_There._

The quickest flash of brightness disappeared into the hatch leading below deck—the hem of a golden coat.

_The coward._ Kylo stalked across the deck and dropped down into the hatch. 

There was no light down here, the gloom unrelieved by the square hole revealing the stormy sky. He could, perhaps, have conjured lightning into his fist, but that would have revealed his position. _And besides,_ he thought as he crept forward, his sword at the ready and his eyes darting warily across the shadows, _how hard should it be to spot Snoke’s ridiculous, gaudy coat?_

But Snoke was nowhere on the gun deck, nor was he on the orlop deck below it. 

Kylo quickened his pace. Finally, he found the former captain of the _Silencer_ in the lowest level of the ship. In the pitch-darkness of the hold, even the shine of his golden coat was muted, but his pale blue eyes _burned._

“Ungrateful brat,” Snoke hissed. “Your pitiful mutiny is doomed.” 

“You are mistaken. The Knights are dispatching your guards as we speak.” Kylo hefted his sword, the point aimed straight for the Old God’s heart. Now lightning crackled around the fingers of his free hand, bathing the hold in a patchy, eerie blue glow. “Where is it?”

“You would reclaim your soul from me, then?” Snoke’s lips twisted into a cruel sneer. “You are too late, my boy.” He looked at something on the floor between them and, almost unwillingly, Kylo’s gaze followed. There, gleaming faintly, lay innumerable shards of glass. 

Kylo froze in disbelief—and horror. “No,” he breathed. 

“You sought to break our contract—to free yourself.” Snoke sounded as though he were chiding an errant pupil—and perhaps in his mind he was. His next words, however, were as cold and cruel as the depths of the ocean around them. 

“But you are not free. You are Kylo Ren, Storm-bringer, Death-dealer, and you shall not be free until your soul is made whole again.” He spread his arms. “Until the sun sinks into the sea, until the Leviathan itself rises from the deep, this ship shall be your anchor and your prison. None aboard shall find rest on land, sea, or air. No one will help you, no one will come for you, for no mortal may board the _Silencer_ and live. This curse I lay upon you, insolent wretch! For you, all is lost!” 

Snoke threw back his head and laughed a horrible, wheezing laugh. He did not stop laughing, even as Kylo’s face twisted with fury and lightning poured forth from his black-gloved hand. 

At last, all was silent, save for the quiet _thump_ as the Old God’s charred, twitching corpse collapsed to the floor of the hold. 

Kylo stood alone, panting from the effort. His gaze fell on the shards of glass once more—and he screamed, “No!” 

##  **🌀**

Rey’s eyes snapped open and she bolted upright in her hammock, that final, anguished shout still ringing in her ears. She clapped a hand over her mouth to stifle her own short, horrified cry.

It seemed she had not been fast enough, for the hammock beneath hers rustled and creaked. A grizzled, sun-lined face glared up at her with bleary eyes. “Quiet, girl! Just ‘cause you can’t sleep doesn’t mean the rest of us shouldn’t!” 

Rey returned the glare as best she could, her efforts somewhat belied by her quick breathing and sleep-mussed hair. “Sorry.”

“Oi, shut the fuck up over there!” came another sleepy yell from the next cluster of hammocks. 

The bickering spread throughout the crew quarters until all, or nearly all, the sailors were up—and incensed at such a rude awakening. The shouting grew louder, and Rey tightened her grip on her crude quarterstaff—she had it on her at all times, even to the point of sleeping with one hand holding the thing—ready to spring from her hammock and crack some heads, should it come to that.

Above them, the hatch to the deck flew open with a loud bang, and a shaft of early morning sunlight streamed into the crew’s quarters. Under any other circumstances, on any other ship, it would perhaps have been a cheery, bracing sight—but on the _Niima_ , the light showed the mildew and the rotting boards that were better left hidden. The sailors squinted and blinked, groaned and swore at the noise and the sudden brightness, and even Rey had to put a hand up to shield her eyes.

Through the hatch, a man came into view—a very large, greasy sort of man, his face alone enough to fill up the whole hatch. 

“Getting an early start today, are we?” barked Unkar Plutt, captain of the _Niima._ “Well, since you’re all so eager to begin, why don’t you get your lazy asses up here and _work?_ Come on! Get cracking!”

With a few final, rebellious mutters, the crew of the _Niima_ shuffled up onto the deck to await the day’s orders, Rey bringing up the rear.

Because she was both young and female, Rey’s work on the _Niima_ was, by and large, the kind that kept her body occupied and her mind free to wander. Furthermore, she’d been doing it for so long that, by now, she was truly only going through the motions. She could thoroughly swab the deck from stem to stern and back again while concocting the most elaborate stories in her head, complete with characters, dialogue, and three acts—five, if the task was particularly long and tedious. 

It was in such a state that she sat in the galley later that day, scrubbing at the grease- and salt-encrusted cookware. She was only vaguely aware of the motion of her hands and the bite of the lye against her skin—she was too busy thinking of the man from her dream.

_Kylo Ren_ , she mused, scrubbing at a particularly stubborn stain. At last, she had a name to put to the face—even if she felt that somehow, it didn’t suit him. 

Ever since she was a child, as far back as she could remember, she’d seen him in her dreams—not every night, but often enough that, by now, he seemed almost familiar. He was fascinating enough that she had made him a near-constant character in her _day_ dreams too. She always saw him on a ship—a gray, forbidding one, wreathed in storm clouds and fog—so he was clearly some kind of sailor. Sometimes she imagined his ship and hers putting in the same port, and then, when Plutt and his crew were deep in their cups, she would sneak off the _Niima_ and onto his ship. Then he’d make her captain, and they’d sail the world together in search of treasure and adventure, and he’d help her find her parents—

Other times she imagined the _Niima_ raiding his ship—or attempting to, anyway—or vice versa. It would be a long and hard battle—although even in dreams she couldn’t bring herself to imagine Plutt’s crew victorious—and some foolhardy sailor would try to take him captive. But she, Rey, would leap to his defense, cracking the attacker solidly across the ribs and over the head with her staff— 

(This, she fully admitted, was girlish fancy at its finest, for she knew that, if he were real, he would likely be capable enough to not need her help.)

Rey would have died rather than admit it, but in truth, her daydreams—about Kylo Ren, about her parents, about leaving the _Niima_ and starting a new life with them—were her only companions. She had no friends on Plutt’s ship, only tenuous, flimsy alliances that did little to dispel the universal sense of distrust that hung over the _Niima_ and its crew. 

A scrabbling sound in the far corner of the galley caught her attention, and Rey dropped the pot (which she had been distractedly cleaning for some time, despite knowing that if the stain hadn’t come off by now, it never would). Going over to investigate, she found Teedo, one of the ship’s powder monkeys, rifling greedily through their meager food stores. 

“Oi!” Rey pointed her staff at him. “Stop, thief!” When he ignored her, she thwacked her staff over his hands with a sharp crack, making him drop the orange he had just snatched up. 

Teedo drew back, swearing. “You little brat! I’ll make you scream for that, I will!” 

Rey’s eyes hardened even further, and she slowly slid one foot backward. He lunged at her, and she dodged, kicking him solidly in the back of the knee as he passed. When he staggered, she swung the staff at the back of his head. Wood met flesh with a dull thud, and he dropped to the ground instantly. 

Rey leaped over his prone body and bolted through the door. She didn’t get very far before she ran into Plutt. “And what do we have here?” He gripped her wrist, and she fought back a flinch. “Slacking off, little Rey?”

“I caught Teedo stealing from the galley!” she cried. It was the truth, and if it took Plutt’s attention off her, then so much the better. “I was just coming to tell you!”

“Really?” Plutt squinted at her. Rey did her best not to squirm or look away, lest he think she was lying. After a moment of suspicious silence, he stumped off to the galley to check, dragging Rey behind him. 

He harrumphed when he saw Teedo’s sprawled, unconscious form on the galley floor, as well as the few oranges that had spilled out from the sack he’d been raiding. “... Well.” 

Rey started to smile. 

“It’s bad form to attack one’s crewmates, little Rey. Very bad form indeed. Honor among thieves and all that. So, as punishment”—he paused, in a poor attempt at drama—“the deck needs a good swabbing.”

“But—” _I just finished that_ — 

Once again, it seemed she hadn’t stopped herself in time. “No ‘but’s, or I’ll make you scrub it too!” Plutt shook a fat finger at her, nearly jabbing her in the nose. “Now go! Up you get, and none of your back talk!” 

Rey stared at his finger for a long second, half-seriously contemplating biting the thing clean off. She decided, as she slung her staff over her shoulders and went in search of the mop and bucket, that not even she could chew through that much fat and gristle.

By the time she had swabbed the deck—again—to Plutt’s satisfaction and was allowed a reprieve, she had missed lunch. Thankfully, the ship’s cook was somewhat less flinty than Plutt and had set aside what little portion of the meal he could for her. Rey’s eyes were dangerously bright as she thanked the cook, and he sent her away with a gruff, “All right, all right, off wi’ ye, now.”

She took her belated meal up to the crow’s nest—one of the few places aboard the _Niima_ where she was fairly sure of remaining undisturbed. The cook had given her little more than a lump of hard tack, a strip of salted meat with a dash of gravy, and a tin cup of watered-down grog, but Rey ate with relish anyway. She was about to lick the crumbs off her fingertips when a seagull landed before her, squawking inquisitively. 

“Sorry, friend.” She spread her empty hands with a small smile. “I’ve just about finished.” 

The gull squawked once more and left with a crisp flap of its wings. It soared low enough that Rey reached up to touch it, and was rewarded with the brief glide of feathers over a fingertip. Farther above her head, the gull rejoined its flock. Rey looked up at the squawking, whirling mass of birds, stark white against the sky, and her smile turned wistful. _I wish I could fly away too._

Suddenly, as if someone had whispered it into her ear, she remembered a warning she’d heard from one of the sailors: “When gulls fly inland, expect a storm.” Suddenly alert, she glanced in the direction from which the birds had flown. 

There, on the horizon, loomed a great, rolling bank of dark gray clouds, swallowing the blue of the sky and casting a shadow over the water. Even at this distance, she could see the flashes of lightning within the morass. The wind blew full in her face— colder now, and tinged with the scent of rain. 

“Storm!” Rey bellowed, leaning out of the crow’s nest as far as she dared. “Storm ho!”

The sailors on deck turned toward the horizon, then scrambled, like weevils emerging from a rotten beam. She heard Plutt cursing the crew’s slowness and yelling for them to batten down the hatches. Then he looked up at her. “Get down here and help, lazy chit!” 

“Shouldn’t we furl the sails?” Rey called back. As if to emphasize her point, the sails rustled as another icy gust blew.

“Leave them up! We’ll outrun it!” 

“But—” 

“ _What_ did I say about your back talk?!”

Rey bit her lip and glanced around her at the sails once more, then swung herself out of the crow’s nest and scrambled down the rigging as quickly as she could.

The _Niima_ , having caught the pre-storm winds, was sailing much faster than she would normally have been capable of. And yet, no matter how quickly the rickety sloop moved across the water, they could not seem to outrun the storm. The crew watched in terror as the storm clouds drew ever closer to the stern. 

Rey, meanwhile, swore she could see the faint outline of a ship within the roiling mass of clouds. 

Then the storm was upon them, and there was no time to think of the strange ship—or of anything much at all, really. The wind ripped the sails to shreds. The mainmast snapped, and the crew scrambled to dodge as it crashed to the deck. The ship pitched and rolled in the waves, and all over the deck, ropes snapped and barrels and crates slid and rolled up and down.

In the chaos, it was all Rey could do to keep her balance and try not to get hit by the flying debris. Another wave rocked the ship, and she careened right into the gunwale. She grunted in pain, but managed to grab onto it and keep from going overboard. 

From there, she saw that she had _not_ been imagining things. There really had been a ship hidden within the storm clouds, and she was looking right at its deck. There stood a group of seven figures, dressed all in black and gray. Six of them leapt from the storm-ship. Rey darted a quick glance over her shoulder and saw some of them wheeling and swooping around the tattered sails and broken masts of the sloop, while others menaced the fleeing sailors. 

For ever after, Rey would not have been able to explain what happened next—even had she ever been inclined to tell anyone. When she looked back at the storm-ship, she somehow saw as clearly through the sheets of rain as if she were right there, only a handspan away from the lone man left on deck.

She recognized him from her dreams.

She opened her mouth to call out to him, hardly knowing what she meant to say, but before she could, the ship bucked violently once more. This time, Rey lost her grip and plunged overboard.

It was no easy feat to right herself and claw her way up through the cold, churning ocean. Nevertheless, she persisted—and eventually, Rey surfaced, gasping for air, her lungs burning. 

She kicked and paddled as best she could to a splintered plank which bobbed up and down in the waves not far from her. She hoisted her chest onto it with numb, shaking fingers, then slumped forward, pressing her forehead to the soaked wood, and breathed a sigh of relief.

The storm had swept her some distance away from the _Niima_ —or what was left of it. Rey peered around frantically, but could see nothing of the ship or its crew, save some flotsam swirling in the water around her. 

After that, there was nothing to do but hold onto the plank as the sea carried it—and her—where it would. Her legs grew numb from the cold of the water, and her arms and hands ached with gripping the wood. But Rey held on—and a night or an eternity later, she vaguely felt her feet, then her legs, dragging over the seafloor. Then there was sand beneath her, and the water receded, and Rey washed onto a beach as the sun rose over the horizon. She turned her head, feeling the rough grains scrape against her cheek. 

As her vision grew fuzzy, she saw a white blur hurrying towards her. 

As blackness crept in at the edges of her vision, she had the vague impression of brown hair and kind eyes. 

As Rey sank into the welcome embrace of unconsciousness, she heard a raspy, feminine voice yelling something that sounded like, “Han, get help!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [This](https://www.pirateglossary.com/anatomy) is the basic layout I imagined for the _Silencer_ and all other ships that appear in this fic.
> 
> If you liked this, please don't forget to leave a comment or kudos, or come say hi on [twitter](https://twitter.com/niennathegrey) or [tumblr](https://niennathegrey.tumblr.com/%22). Thanks for reading!


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw: brief period-typical sexism and classism from Hux

**_Five years later…_ **

Rey lifted the spyglass from her eye. “See that?” she called to her crew. 

“A First Order galleon?” said Rose Tico, quartermaster of the _Sunspear._

“Not just any First Order galleon,” Finn, the first mate, added, after taking a look through his own spyglass. “That’s the _Finalizer._ ”

Rey smiled sweetly. “Yes.” 

Finn stared at her. Then his jaw fell open, and he began to shake his head. “Oh no, please tell me you’re not thinking—” 

The _Finalizer_ was one of the First Order’s most well-fitted—and more importantly, well-stocked—ships. Furthermore, Armitage Hux was one of its most infamous captains, with a king’s bounty on his head. Rey’s smile only widened. “Queen Leia will be pleased when she sees what fine fish we’ve caught today, don’t you think?”

“Rey, come on! That’d be a suicide run, not a raid!” 

She shook her head. “The _Sunspear_ is the fastest ship in the Alderaanian fleet—she can handle it! Think of the booty we’d bring back if we pull it off!”

“Think of our heads hanging from their bowsprit when we fail, more like,” Finn muttered. 

“All right, that’s enough,” Rose interposed. “Rey—Captain—anything that takes the First Order down a peg or ten has my vote.” 

As it turned out, most of the crew shared Rose’s opinion. The _Sunspear_ drew alongside the _Finalizer_ , and half the crew threw grappling hooks from their gunwale while the other half laid down cover fire. Rey had been right: their speed helped them take the other ship by surprise, and in short order, she, Rose, and Finn stood with half their crew on the deck of the _Finalizer_. 

The First Order sailors gaped at their audacity, and Captain Hux’s pale, pinched face grew even more pinched as he sneered down from the quarterdeck. “Ah, the _Sunspear_ and her crew of rabble.” 

“You’ve heard of us?” Finn asked, sounding caught between dismay and pride.

“Then you must also know what we want.” Rey unslung the leather strap of her swordstaff from over her shoulder and held it upright, though she did not yet point it at Hux. The long steel blades on both ends of the staff gleamed in the sun. “Hand over your cargo and surrender peacefully, and you and your crew will be spared. You have my word.”

Hux let out a short, disdainful bark of laughter. “Insolent chit! You are outnumbered and outgunned. My men have nerves of steel and the discipline of an army. Do you truly think you have a prayer of victory, or have you simply run mad?” 

Rey’s grip on her staff tightened, and she forced herself not to scowl. “Are you refusing to surrender, then?”

“To arms, men!” Hux bellowed. “Show this pack of thieves and traitors the might of the First Order!”

The _Sunspear_ ’s sailors raised a wordless, rousing, shout in reply, and the two crews charged into battle. 

As the melee began, Hux unholstered his pistol and fired at Rey. She had been expecting it and dodged the shot. Then she swooped in close—close enough to foul his aim—and twisted her staff sharply. The flat of one blade smacked against Hux’s hand with enough force to knock the pistol out of his grasp. 

Rey promptly kicked it away, sending it spinning down the deck. “Only a coward brings a gun to a sword fight.” 

Hux sniffed—although Rey did not miss the way he subtly flexed the fingers of his suddenly empty hand. “Only gentlemen duel—and you, good captain”—he tipped his hat at her mockingly—“are neither a man nor genteel.”

Rey snorted. “Are you so afraid of me?” She leapt forward, the point of her swordstaff aimed straight for Hux’s heart. 

He sidestepped the attack and finally drew his own rapier. “Afraid? Of the Alderaanian queen's pet mongrel? Hardly.”

Rey parried his thrust and pivoted on her heel, sending Hux off-balance at the sudden lack of resistance. She swatted him in the back with the flat of her blade as he staggered, grinning fiercely at his high, affronted yelp. “ _You’re_ the dog here. I serve Queen Leia out of gratitude and respect.” 

Hux spun back around and lunged towards Rey again. “Gratitude?” Once more, she met the edge of his blade with her own, and he sneered at her over their locked weapons. “Yes, I can well imagine you have much to thank Her Majesty for.” He pressed harder. “For we _have_ heard of you, Rey of the _Sunspear_. Many things, few of which are to your credit.” 

Rey bared her teeth at him, viciously shoving his blade aside. She spun her staff and thrust once more, and once more he parried. She continued to press the attack, her blades clanging and clashing against his, and still he deflected, and still he talked. 

“From nowhere, a girl of nineteen, with no name, rank or fortune, is given the captaincy of a ship in the Alderaanian fleet?” Hux scoffed. “Ludicrous. A pet mongrel is still a mongrel, whatever its mistress may call it. That _is_ why you were foolhardy enough to attempt to raid my ship, is it not? Performing tricks for attention?” 

With a furious snarl, Rey lunged forward. The point of her blade bit deep into Hux’s arm. He shrieked in pain and dropped his rapier, the dark cloth of his sleeve darkened further by a bloom of blood. 

She raised her staff, the point aimed at his throat. “Surrender.” 

Hux glared at her and opened his mouth, as if to sneer a refusal. Then his eyes rolled back, and he dropped unceremoniously to the deck with a solid thump—revealing Rose behind him, her pistol still raised from where she had clubbed him over the head with it. 

Rey huffed, slinging her staff back over her shoulder. “I had it under control.”

Rose raised an eyebrow. “I know. That was for _me_.” 

##  **🌀**

They took the _Finalizer_ —not without injuries, nor even without casualties, but take it they did. The _Sunspear’_ s sailors locked the majority of the crew in the brig, save for those few sailors who had surrendered, or pleaded for mercy, or agreed to join the Alderaanian navy instead. 

Then Rey, Rose, and Finn took half their boarding party back to the _Sunspear_ in longboats, filled with as much cargo as they could hold. Said cargo included Hux, for both Rey and Rose took a certain vindictive pleasure at the thought of collecting the bounty on his head. 

By the time they had finished bringing everything aboard, the sun was low in the sky. Rey arched an eyebrow as one sailor produced a fiddle, while another passed a bottle of rum and some tankards around. “It’s almost sundown. We should get underway.” 

Finn slung a companionable arm over her shoulders. “Aw, come on, Captain, let’s live a little! It’s not every day we capture a First Order ship!” 

The bottle and tankards made their rounds among the crew. Soon, the fiddler started playing, and the sailors sang along, clapping their hands and stamping their feet. Finn jumped up and offered a hand to Rose with a flourish. She snorted and laughed, but took his hand anyway. The two began whirling inelegantly around the deck, vaguely in time to the music, as the crew laughed and cheered.

Rey, meanwhile, stood on the fringes, subtly edging away from the merrymaking. 

Rose, ever astute, noticed. “Hey, where are you going?” she called, flushed and grinning. 

Rey glanced over her shoulder. “To keep watch.” 

“No, stay!” cried Finn. “Join the party, Rey!” 

Rey shook her head with a smile and a roll of her eyes. “Oh, all right. Just one drink, mind.” She motioned for a tankard, raised it in salute, and downed the rum in four quick swallows. “There.” She raised the now-empty tankard again, to the cheers and claps of her crew. “Now I’m off to be a good, responsible captain while you all drink and dance the night away.” 

The sailors put up a token, laughing protest, but soon resumed their merriment. As Rey slipped away, she heard someone mutter rebelliously, “Fancy young miss. Thinks she’s too good for us, does she?” 

“Let her go,” replied his companion with a belch. “If she’d rather stare at the sea all by her lonesome than share a drink with her fellows, it’s her loss.” 

On the _Niima_ , climbing up to the crow’s nest had always soothed Rey. It had helped to be able to feel like she could _rise above_ her problems, if only for a few minutes and only in the literal sense. Now, though, try as she might to lose herself in the feel of the wind on her face and the gentle lap of the waves, Hux’s sneers still echoed in her ears. 

_He’s wrong_ , Rey thought, scowling. _He doesn’t know a thing about me_. She’d raided the _Finalizer_ because the First Order was greedy and corrupt, and many of the _Sunspear’_ s crew—Rose and Finn, especially—had suffered for it. Leia’s approval would be a nice bonus, that was all. 

And she was no mongrel—she wasn’t that scrappy, starving cabin girl anymore. She was a ward of the Queen and King Consort of Alderaan. She had become captain of her own ship at the age of nineteen. She had come so far in five years—and, oh, wouldn’t her parents be proud of their girl if they could see her now?

Then why couldn’t she shake Hux’s insults from her mind? Why did she still feel cold and hollow—

 _No_ , Rey told herself with a firm shake of her head. _Don’t waste a second more on him._

Had she still been on the _Niima_ , this would have been the point where she started spinning another fantasy of her parents coming back for her, telling her they loved her and had missed her so much, they’d never leave her again. Rey tried to reach for the threads of her old daydreams, but now even those felt hollow and childish. There was no room or time for such fancies—not anymore. Even Kylo Ren had receded into the back of her mind, though her dreams of him had not stopped. 

And then, as the last rays of the sun faded into the purple twilight, Rey saw the dark clouds creeping over the horizon, lightning flashing in their midst.

_No._

“Storm!” she shouted down, already scrambling across the rigging. “Storm ho! Batten down the hatches! I’ll furl the sails! _Hurry!_ ” 

Her shouts, aided by the first icy pinpricks of rain, instantly sobered the crew of the _Sunspear_. A handful of sailors, led by Finn, climbed up the shrouds to help her furl the sails. The rest of the crew ran around the deck, securing the hatches and the cannons.

Then there was nothing to do but steer the ship as best they could—and pray to whatever gods might be listening. 

Rey was afraid, of course, but it would not do to let her crew see it. She tried to keep calm, to give orders in as level a voice as she could, but she could not look away from the storm as it chased them over the water with supernatural speed. 

Her heart hammered in her throat—as well it might, because as the clouds broke upon them, she saw it again: the same storm-ship from five years ago. There were the seven figures in black and gray—six leaping from the deck of their ship to hers, terrorizing her crew and crippling the ship even further, one left on the deck to survey the chaos.

The wind howled around her, the rain lashed her, and the terrified shouts of her crew rang in her ears. Yet Rey stilled as though she were in the eye of the storm. 

“It is you,” she murmured.

She had thought, however briefly, of Kylo Ren once more, and he had appeared. Had she summoned him somehow? Was he a bad omen, or—considering that the last time she saw him, her cruel master had been killed—a good one? 

Whatever he was, Rey knew she would not get such an opportunity again. She fought to get to the gunwale as the deck sloped dizzyingly. 

“Storm-bringer!” she shouted into the wind. “Kylo Ren!” 

He should not have been able to hear her—but somehow he must have, for he turned to look in her direction. They were too far away to see each other’s faces, but even at this distance, even through the pouring rain, Rey could feel the weight of his gaze on her. 

She opened her mouth again, to call out she knew not what—perhaps a plea for him to stop the storm and leave them in peace—but then the _Sunspear_ lurched violently, and the deck and the world fell out from beneath her. 

Whatever she might have said was lost as she plunged into the churning ocean. 

##  **🌀**

The wind carried the girl’s cry to him, and Kylo’s head whipped around.

The girl had seen him—had called his name. 

_How?_

He gazed at the deck of the other ship. There she stood at the gunwale, the only still figure amid the mayhem. He saw dark hair and a gray vest, opened over a pale tunic. He wished he were close enough to see the look on her face.

_Who are you?_

Then her ship heaved— rolled— and the girl vanished from his sight, going down into the sea with all the rest.

There was little, if any, conscious thought in what he did next. 

Kylo raced to the side of the deck and flung himself over the gunwale. 

The icy water closed over his head, but it did not steal the breath from his lungs, nor the strength from his limbs. He looked around frantically until he saw the pale blotch of her tunic standing out in the gloom. Propelling himself towards her with a few powerful kicks, he secured her with an arm wrapped around her chest. She was limp in his hold, and he kicked and pushed them upwards. 

Out of the corner of his eye, Kylo saw pale, bloated hands reaching for him. The water muffled sound, yet he could hear a thick, gruesome gurgling that only seemed to grow louder—and angrier—by the second. 

_No, no, not now_. He wanted to squeeze his eyes shut and claw at his ears. 

He stopped swimming and raised his free arm in a single sharp motion. The water around him responded, lifting him and the girl until they rose out of the sea on the crest of a giant wave. It curved over the _Silencer_ and dropped them soundly, if inelegantly, onto the deck as it broke. 

Both his brief swim and his use of power were nothing to him, yet Kylo’s chest heaved as though he had swum the entire width of the ocean. When he had his breath back, he released the girl and sat back on his heels, studying her unconscious face with open curiosity.

Her dark hair was coming loose from her odd, triple-bunned hairstyle, the curling locks plastered to her cheeks and neck. Her features were what he—in his very limited experience—might have called dainty: high forehead and cheekbones, a pert nose, thin, rosy lips. There was a light dusting of freckles over her tanned skin, as one might expect from a sailor. 

All told, she was no great beauty, at least not in the way court ladies took pains to be. However, she certainly wasn’t _un_ attractive, either— 

He shook his head and scoffed at himself. _Oh, for gods’ sake._

Two things happened, then. 

First, the girl’s eyelashes fluttered—the only warning before she jerked awake with a loud gasp. She promptly rolled onto her side and began coughing up the seawater in her lungs.

Second, the Knights alighted on the deck, having finished plundering the other ship as it sank. He had his back to them, but their raucous laughter and the thump of their boots were announcement enough. 

“Good hunting today, lady and gentlemen!” Ap’lek called, raising a bottle of rum and taking a hearty pull. 

“What’ve you got there, Ren?” Vicrul called out as they approached. “Anything interesting?” 

Kylo heard the other man come up behind him, then stop short and draw in a sharp breath. “What the hell did you do?”

“Something the matter, gents?” Trudgen, his cleaver slung casually over his shoulders, ambled over. He, too, stopped short, crying, “What the _fuck_ , Ren?”

The exclamation drew the other four Knights’ attention. They came over to investigate, and Kylo was treated to the unique sight of all six Knights of Ren clustered round and gawking like startled crows at the sight of a drenched, half-drowned girl. 

“Tired of our scintillating company, were you?” Cato asked dryly.

Kuruk folded his arms and gave Kylo a look that was almost pitying. “You know this can’t end well, don’t you?”

Kylo glared over his shoulder at him, then promptly turned back around as the girl’s coughing trailed off, replaced by quick, gulping breaths. His hand hovered awkwardly in the space between them ( _to do_ what?).

She raised her head and looked at him with wary eyes— _hazel eyes_ , he noted distantly, with the small part of his brain that wasn’t suddenly alight with anticipation of _something_ —some nameless, undefinable thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you liked this, please don't forget to leave a comment or kudos, or come say hi on [twitter](https://twitter.com/niennathegrey) or [tumblr](https://niennathegrey.tumblr.com/%22). Thanks for reading!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the late update—it's been a _very_ eventful few days, as I'm sure we're all aware. (Congratulations, US readers! 💙💙💙)
> 
> Potential cw: one of the Knights suggests that Kylo slap Rey, though he doesn't do it. If you'd like to skip that line, it's the paragraph between "No response, save more muttering" and "Instead..."

When Rey had believed Kylo Ren resided only in her mind, she had mostly thought of him in general terms: pale skin, dark hair and eyes, tall and broad frame. Now he was before her in the flesh, and _oh_ , the haze of dreams had not done him justice. 

His every feature was striking, from his narrow, angular face to his long nose to his full, red mouth. He had a scattering of beauty marks, all the starker for being set against such pale skin. His hair hung in wet waves, disheveled enough to reveal the tip of a large ear. And, _gods_ , his eyes— they were a deep, rich brown, and currently fixed on her face with a strange, intense curiosity. 

Rey didn’t know what she wanted more: to run and hide, or to look closer at what lay behind those dark eyes. “Where am I?” 

“You’re on the _Silencer_ ,” he replied in a low, smooth baritone. He gestured to the six sailors standing around, watching them avidly. “These are the Knights of Ren, my crew. And I”—he inclined his head—“am Kylo Ren, though somehow you already know that.”

“The _Silencer_?” she exclaimed. “But— but it’s just a myth, an old sailor’s tale.” 

It was one of the many yarns sailors told to enliven a long, quiet watch. The _Silencer_ , they said, was the phantom ship that brought the storms at sea. It was perpetually wreathed in clouds and fog, making it nigh-impossible to see. And of the few who did, fewer still lived to tell the tale, for it was captained by a demon and crewed by the ghosts of drowned men, and they were always hungry for fresh blood. 

Kylo arched an eyebrow, a corner of his mouth twitching. “I’m quite real, I assure you.”

Rey lifted her chin stubbornly, willing herself not to blush. 

“Who are you?” he asked. 

“No one.”

“Indeed?” Kylo sounded faintly amused. “Well, nobody or not, your crew must call you something.”

“Rey,” she said at last. “Captain Rey of the _Sunspear_. Or at least I was, until—” It came back to her in a rush: the storm, her crew’s screams, her ship— _her ship!_ —sinking. Anger rose within her, hot and thick. 

“Yes, yes, this is all very charming,” drawled one of the Knights, a lean, sandy-haired man trailed by curling wisps of fog, “but you know she can’t be here.”

“Our noble captain forgot to mention one thing,” said a dark-haired woman. She smiled, bright and deadly, like the static dancing over her clothes and in the air around her. “‘No mortal shall board the _Silencer_ and live.’”

Rey’s eyes widened, and she gazed at them all in mute horror.

Despite the overt threat, however, none of them looked actively hostile towards her. Kylo had a broadsword slung over his shoulder, but made no move to draw it. He still knelt at arm’s length from her, his hand half-raised, as if _she_ were the wild thing and he the tamer. The Knights stood with hands on hips, or with folded arms, and seemed almost _amused_ , as if watching a rowdy pair of children at play. 

Rey turned back to Kylo and said, in the same commanding tone she would have used on her crew, “Let me go.” 

A muscle beneath his eye twitched. He shook his head, reaching for her. “No, you can’t—”

“Watch me!” Quick as thought, she drew a knife from her boot and slashed him across the face. 

Kylo reared back, clapping a hand over the briskly bleeding wound. The Knights cried out, but again, they sounded more surprised and entertained than anything. While they were distracted, Rey sprang to her feet and raced across the deck. She was surprised that they made no move to stop her, or to defend Kylo—though she certainly wasn’t complaining. 

Diving over the gunwale, she began swimming the moment she hit the water. She thought she heard them shouting after her, but dared not look back to check. She had no direction in mind—nor could she have told east from west, given the thick fog and clouds around the ship—only the half-formed thought of finding any flotsam from the _Sunspear_ that she could use to paddle herself to the nearest piece of land.

The mist over the water swirled and shifted, and Unkar Plutt appeared—towering and bulbous, the way he would have looked to a child of five or six. “Back to work, lazy brat!” he roared, his face crumpling in on itself and dripping like candle wax around his gaping mouth. 

Rey froze in shock. “Impossible.” 

When she felt herself start to sink, she pushed on, shaking her head sharply enough that her soaked hair slapped against her cheeks. 

This time it was Leia and Han who appeared in the fog. Real or no, Rey could not deny the rush of relief at the sight of their warm, familiar faces. She imagined this was what it felt like to have parents: if she could just reach them, they would make everything better—

—but they turned and walked off into the mist. 

“Wait,” she gasped, kicking faster, trying to keep them in her sights. 

“Rey…” 

“Captain…” 

Those were decidedly _not_ Leia and Han’s voices. Rey was torn between swimming on, as hard and as fast as she could, and looking frantically around for survivors from her crew. 

“I’m here!” she called. “Where are you?” 

As if in answer, pale, bloated corpses bobbed up from the sea around her: Finn, Rose, and all the rest. They reached out to her, speaking in thick, horrible gurgles, and Rey let out a gasping sob. 

“Some captain you were, Rey.”

“Why didn’t you save us, Rey?” 

“A good captain always goes down with her ship.” 

And then their hands were on her, clawing at her arms, her legs, her waist, dragging her down into the sea with them. Rey kicked and thrashed and screamed until the water closed over her head and rushed into her mouth. 

🌀

Ignoring the Knights’ exasperated calls after him, Kylo threw himself overboard for the second time in almost as many minutes. 

Finding Rey and bringing her back on deck was easy enough, her struggling in his hold notwithstanding. When they were aboard once more, Kylo knelt before her. She was trembling, and her eyes were wide, unseeing— _terrified._

“No, please, don’t,” she muttered, her voice thick with tears, “please come back. I’ll be good, I promise.”

Something twisted fiercely in Kylo’s chest at the sight of this spitfire of a girl weeping and pleading with invisible figures. He didn’t know what sort of hell she thought she was in—only that he wanted to bring her out of it. He shook her gently by the shoulder. “Rey.”

No response, save more muttering. 

“Perhaps you should slap her,” Ushar suggested. When Kylo sent her a withering look, she shrugged, the motion punctuated by the sharp crackle of static. “What? It worked on you, didn’t it?”

Instead, he cupped her cheek, slowly running his thumb back and forth along the bone. Perhaps touch would help anchor her in reality. “Rey, whatever you’re seeing, it isn’t real. Wake up.” 

When Rey remained unresponsive, Kylo sent a small burst of lightning—barely an ant bite’s worth of sensation, meant to stimulate rather than injure—through his thumb and into her body. He would have bitten his own tongue off before admitting it, but he was at his wits’ end and could see no other way to awaken her. 

Luckily, it seemed his instincts had been right. Rey jerked slightly, her eyelids fluttering. Slowly, her pupils contracted, and the fog began to clear from her eyes. 

##  **🌀**

The visions blurred and faded, and Rey realized she was face-to-face with Kylo once more. His right cheek was bisected by a line of bright red blood, and she briefly doubted whether she really had woken up. Instinct took over, and she slapped him—right over the fresh wound. He thrust her away, swearing viciously as the Knights sniggered and elbowed each other.

Rey shivered. “Oh, gods, you _are_ real.”

“That’s a fine way to thank someone who’s saved your life twice now.” Even muffled by the hand pressed to his face, Kylo sounded very disgruntled indeed. 

“Thank? You want _thanks?_ You’ve trapped me on your damned ship!” 

“Join the club, lady,” grumbled one of the Knights, a muscular, swarthy man trailing rivulets of seawater over the deck from his soaked clothes. 

“Is that why you brought me aboard?” Rey demanded. “To become a monster like you?”

Kylo seemed about to snap at her, and she tensed. Then she shivered again, the chill of being dunked in the ocean twice in quick succession catching up to her. 

Kylo’s jaw worked, as if he were physically swallowing his words, and he rose to his feet in one fluid motion. “Get her some dry clothes,” he ordered the Knights as he strode away, “and find her a place to sleep.”

“I won’t take charity from a murderer!” Rey spat at his retreating back. 

He paused, and Rey thought he would turn back. But it only lasted a moment, and he walked off in silence. 

“Interesting,” drawled one of the men—a dark, wiry fellow, slightly shorter than his shipmates and attended by his own personal rain cloud. 

“Why doesn’t he look after his own damned pet?” hissed the dark-haired woman.

“I am _no one’s_ pet!” Rey snapped, fierce despite the shivers that continued to wrack her.

“Ooh, he likes them feisty,” chuckled another man, his voice rumbling like thunder. “Never would have guessed.”

“Enough chattering,” said the red-haired woman, taking Rey by the arm. “You need clothes. Come on.” When Rey tried to shake her off, the redhead shook her in return, though much more roughly. “Look, I really don’t care whether or not you catch your death of cold. But it’s not worth the hell _he’ll_ ”—she jerked her head in the direction Kylo had left—“raise if you do. Now, _come on._ ”

“Also,” added the sandy-haired man, “we’re less patient than he is. I suggest you not test _how_ much less.”

Rey set her jaw, as much to show defiance as to stop her teeth from chattering. “Fine.” She allowed the redhead to lead her to the crew quarters and silently accepted the dry tunic and pants thrust at her. 

“Well, you’re certainly not sleeping with _us_ ,” the redhead muttered. She made her way to the hold, Rey trailing listlessly behind. Now that she was in dry clothes, the day’s many exhaustions were making themselves known, and it was all she could do to keep her eyes open. 

The redhead left her in the hold without another word, and Rey barely waited for the sound of her footsteps to fade before curling up on the bare boards. She was asleep almost before her head hit her bent arm. 

🌀

Years of sleeping among a less-than-friendly crew had made Rey a light sleeper. Sensing someone standing over her as she woke, she pushed herself into a defensive crouch the second her eyes opened.

Kylo arched an eyebrow. “Good morning to you too.”

“What do you want?” she snapped. 

“I thought,” he replied, with glacial courtesy, “that you might prefer more comfortable quarters.” He extended a black-gloved hand. 

Rey eyed it and pointedly rose to her feet unaided. 

Kylo made a tiny shrug and let his hand fall back to his side. “Follow me,” he said over his shoulder as he left the hold. Even as Rey bristled at the haughty command, she couldn’t help noticing how easily he turned his back on her, as if he trusted her not to attack him—or was confident that she could not. 

She wasn’t sure what she’d expected, but it hadn’t been her own cabin. True, it wasn’t the great cabin, with its three wide windows, that most ships had in the stern. Instead, it was the smaller one, with similar windows, on the deck below it, which was usually given to officers on the really fancy galleons. Still, it looked comfortable—which, in her opinion, was even more confusing than having her own cabin in the first place. 

He held the door open, and Rey eyed him suspiciously as she hovered on the threshold. “Am I your prisoner?”

“You’re my guest,” Kylo replied.

Now she looked at him with outright scorn. 

His jaw worked a bit, and he continued, “If you need anything, ask me or the Knights. You’re as free to roam the ship as we are, though I suppose I don’t need to tell you you can’t leave.”

“A guest who can’t leave? Sounds an awful lot like a prisoner to me.”

He made no reply as he left, and it was only when he was out of sight that Rey stepped into the cabin, shutting the door firmly behind her. 

Kylo did not approach her again, but he sent the Knights to make sure she was fed and clothed. They knocked on her door thrice a day like clockwork, left her food outside with a careless clatter, and walked away, seemingly not caring whether she answered or not. 

At first, Rey did _not_ answer. But on the third morning, one of the women spoke through the door, the ire in her voice audible even through the wood. “We may be Ren’s crew, but we do not serve _you_ , mortal. _Open this fucking door_ before I come in and ram this bread down your ungrateful throat.” 

Rey quickly complied—and was greeted with the dark-haired woman’s baleful eyes as she shoved the tray into her chest and stomped away, lightning crackling in her wake. 

After that, she started answering the door and thanking the Knights for their hospitality. Some were less inclined to be civil than others, but eventually, she managed to learn their names and abilities.

The two women were Ap’lek and Ushar. Ap’lek was the redhead whose clothes she had borrowed. Her hair and clothes were always in motion, as if stirred by some wind only she felt. Ushar was the brunette, as irascible and prickly as the lightning that surrounded her. 

Of the two water spirits, Vicrul’s hair was longer, and his skin was a lighter, sandy shade of brown. He also had a rain cloud perpetually hanging over his head—Rey had had the mad urge to giggle when she first noticed it. In contrast, Cato’s dark curls were cropped close to his scalp, and his skin was a warm sepia brown. There was no rain cloud above him, but he was nevertheless constantly soaked to the skin, seawater puddling beneath his boots and trailing wherever he walked. 

Trudgen was the biggest of the Knights, and regardless of his mood, his voice always seemed about to explode into a thunderclap. Kuruk was the most taciturn and solitary of them, and he was surrounded by wisps of fog and cloud.

Neither Kylo nor the Knights seemed inclined to put her to any sort of work, and Rey realized that she now had the luxury of _truly_ free time, for perhaps the first time in her life. It only baffled her, no matter how much of said free time she spent trying to rationalize their behavior.

Kylo had saved her twice, yes—but because of him, she was trapped aboard the _Silencer._ Then he had given her the second-best cabin and ensured—even indirectly—that she was taken care of. Rey might have guessed that he meant to make her his mistress, or perhaps hold her for ransom, but she had not seen or spoken to him again after he’d showed her to her cabin. 

She asked the Knights what he wanted from her, but their answers were all variations of “I don’t know,” ranging from irritated to amused. “You might try asking _Ren_ , not us,” Cato said once, but she ignored the suggestion.

Idleness had never sat well with her, so she kept as busy as she could. Some light snooping in the hold revealed many unused lengths of wood, as well as a rather alarming pile of weaponry. She took a thick pole and a pair of daggers and began whittling a new staff, tying a dagger to each end as a crude replacement for the swordstaff she’d lost in the wreck. (That was another piece of the puzzle: they had let her keep her own weapons, although the pistol was now waterlogged and useless.) 

It didn't take her very long to finish, and then she no longer knew what to do with herself. She mentioned it to Vicrul one morning, and he stared at her, bemused. “There’s really not much work to be done aboard a storm-ship, mortal.”

Later that afternoon, Kylo brought her food himself, looking equally baffled. “I did mean it when I said you were a guest.”

“I’m no blushing noblewoman,” Rey said. “I can’t sit around doing nothing all day.”

“You want work, little mortal?” Ap’lek had drifted by to watch the exchange. “All right.” She jerked a thumb upward. “Change the position of the topsail, and do it without anyone’s help. That should keep you _quite_ busy.”

On a full-crewed ship, that would have needed at least four to six able-bodied sailors. Rey suspected that storm spirits had it easier, which was why Ap’lek had given her the task in the first place. But ingenuity and persistence had helped her survive her stint on the _Niima_ , and so they would here too. 

She picked through every room and crawlspace she could reach until she had everything she needed. Then it was only a matter of putting everything together and waiting for a calm day to reveal the crude pulley system she had spliced together.

The Knights were reluctantly impressed, at best, but Rey grinned proudly anyway as the topsail swung jerkily around the mast. Then she saw the slight hint of approval in Kylo’s eyes, the near-imperceptible curve of his mouth. 

Her heart skipped a beat.

##  **🌀**

_It was too good to be true_ , Kylo thought as he stood in Rey’s cabin, looking down at her still form. Trudgen had come to fetch him, looking uncharacteristically serious as he explained how, when Rey had not answered the door that morning, he’d gone in and found her in bed, burning with fever. 

“ _No mortal shall board the_ Silencer _and live_ ,” Snoke had said. Now his curse was taking effect, and—god though Kylo was—he could do nothing to stop it. There were, obviously, no medicines onboard, and what power he had was for destruction, not healing. “Tell Kuruk to set a course for Takodana. _Now_.” 

As the door shut behind Trudgen, Rey stirred. “Kylo?” 

He wavered for a moment before perching on the edge of the mattress, so as not to loom over her like some great, hulking carrion-bird. “Yes?”

“I don’t feel well.” She didn’t sound it, either. She sounded exhausted, and very young. “Tired. Everything hurts.” 

A swell of sympathy rose within Kylo. With a wave of his hand, he conjured a tiny rain cloud to fill her washbasin and dunked a cloth into it. “I know,” he murmured, wiping the sweat from her face and neck. “It’s going to be all right.”

Rey hummed at the touch of the wet cloth. “Feels good.” She looked up at him, suddenly lucid. “I’m going to die, aren’t I?”

The leather of his gloves squelched as his fingers clenched involuntarily around the cloth. “No, no, you’re not.” He tried to keep the edge of panic out of his voice, and wondered whether he was trying to convince her or himself. “You’re too strong and too stubborn to die. I won’t allow it.”

She smiled weakly—and somehow, even laid this low, she made his breath catch in his throat. “I don’t understand you, I really don’t.” Her voice trailed off into a sigh as her eyes drifted shut again. 

He brushed a lock of hair away from her face, the heat of her skin palpable even through his gloves. “Fight, Rey,” he whispered. _Please._

The Knights were waiting for him when he went topside. 

“You know,” said Ap’lek, her voice heavy with implication, “there _is_ a simple solution to your problem.”

“No,” Kylo replied, flatly and with finality. 

Cato made a disgusted sound. “What the hell are you playing at, Ren? You can’t keep her—not for long, anyway.”

He wouldn’t have answered, even had he known what to say. So instead he strode past them all to stand at the gunwale and stare at the ocean. 

Maz must have seen the clouds on the horizon, because she met them out beyond the shallows of Takodana, her island home. The tiny sea-witch stood atop a wave that lifted her level with the deck, from which she addressed them. “Kylo Ren. Not that this isn’t a pleasant surprise, but I’ve already told you I can’t help—” 

He shook his head, almost stumbling over his words in his haste. “This isn’t about me. There’s a girl on my ship and she’s dying _._ ”

Maz’s eyes widened, an action emphasized by her giant spectacles. “What?”

“Scold me later," he snapped. "Just _help her._ ” 

Maz gave him a long, inscrutable look, then nodded. “Bring her to me.”

Kylo rushed below deck and returned as quickly as he could, carrying Rey in his arms. She revived a little in the fresh air, her cheek nuzzling against his shoulder as she tried to turn her face into the breeze.

“Shhh,” he whispered, “you’ll feel better soon.”

Maz leaned closer as he approached, and Kylo caught a glimpse of her knowing smile. Then it disappeared, replaced by closed eyes and meditative calmness. She laid a hand on Rey’s brow, a soft blue glow appearing where they touched. “Don’t be afraid, Storm-bringer,” she said after a moment, heedless of Kylo’s shocked, tense gaze upon her. “The girl is strong. Stronger than even she knows, I think.”

“Dear child,” she intoned, now clearly speaking to Rey. “Whatever you seek is not there in the darkness. It is _here_. Come back to us. There is still much left for you to do.”

As the glow beneath Maz’s hands faded, Rey stirred. When she opened her eyes, they were clear and keen once more—and they widened as she realized whose arms she was cradled in. “Oi!” She squirmed and twisted. “Put me down, I’m fine!” 

Kylo complied, the tight press of his lips relaxing at the renewed flush on her cheeks. “Clearly.”

Maz smiled indulgently. “This one’s a keeper.”

At this, Kylo’s eye twitched, and his ears burned underneath his hair.

“ _Keeper_?” Rey gaped at the sea-witch, horrified. “No, thanks! I want to get _off_ this damned ship!”

“Oh?” Maz glanced at Kylo, and he resisted the urge to scuff his boot against the deck like a sheepish schoolboy. “Dare I ask?”

Sensing a potentially sympathetic ear for the first time in days, Rey leaned forward, nearly grasping Maz’s hands in her eagerness. “He wrecked my ship, killed my crew, then trapped me onboard his ship! Please help me. I just want to go home.” 

Maz looked from Kylo to Rey and back, her expression inscrutable. “I see,” she said at last. “I’m sorry, but I can’t help you.” 

“But—”

“That ship is cursed—it will always be hostile to the living. It’s dark magic—hateful and beastly.” Maz gave a barely concealed shudder of distaste. “And beyond my power to break—I can only slow it, not stop it entirely. I’ve delayed it until the winter solstice, when dark magic is at its strongest. If you haven’t broken the curse by then, it will claim your life, and no magic of mine will save you.” 

Rey jerked her head at Kylo and the Knights. “Then why aren’t _they_ dying?”

Ap’lek arched an eyebrow. “We’re not mortal. You know that.” 

“Can’t you turn me immortal like them?”

“You don’t know what you’re asking,” Kylo said grimly, and Rey looked at him in confusion. 

“He’s right,” Maz said. “Besides, I can’t do it. As I said, I don’t have the power to change things’—or people’s—fundamental natures like that. That kind of magic belongs to the Old Gods alone. You’ll have to break the curse the old-fashioned way, dear child.” 

Rey gulped and looked shaken for a moment. She was seized with the urge to bodily shake the tiny sea-witch and yell, “But I don’t know anything about magic!” Then she set her jaw and gave a decisive nod—she’d never backed down from a challenge before, and wasn’t about to start now. “I will. Or die trying.” 

_Gods, I hope not_. Kylo wasn’t sure which was more surprising: that he’d thought it at all, or that he truly meant it. He turned to Maz and bowed formally. “My thanks for your assistance, Sea-Witch.”

Maz nodded with equal politeness. “I wish you all good fortune.” 

The wave receded, and she walked over the water back to Takodana as the _Silencer_ sailed onward. 

The excitement over, the Knights drifted away. Kylo and Rey stood on deck, looking at each other in recognition of a common goal. 

“Why didn’t you just let me die?” she asked, her brow furrowing. 

“Because,” he replied, looking her in the eye, willing her to understand, “I don’t want to kill you, Rey. I never have.” _But it looks like I’m killing you anyway._

Rey tilted her head, looking at him like he was a particularly complex lock on a treasure chest. At last, she said, “Well, I don’t plan on going down without a fight. We have about two moons until the winter solstice and not a moment to lose. Now, where do we start?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, [here's](https://www.pirateglossary.com/anatomy) the basic layout of the _Silencer_.
> 
> If anyone's curious, here are my personal fancasts for the Knights of Ren:
> 
>   * Rose Leslie as [Ap'lek](https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Ap%27lek)
>   * Gemma Chan as [Ushar](https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Ushar)
>   * Max Minghella as [Vicrul](https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Vicrul)
>   * Michael B. Jordan as [Cato](https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Cardo%22)* 
>   * Channing Tatum as [Trudgen](https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Trudgen)
>   * Dan Stevens as [Kuruk](https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Kuruk)
> 

> 
> * Canonically, his name is Cardo, but because I cannot take that name seriously (in my country, it's the name of a protagonist on a _very narmy_ long-running TV show), I changed it. 
> 
> If you liked this, please don't forget to leave a comment or kudos, or come say hi on [twitter](https://twitter.com/niennathegrey) or [tumblr](https://niennathegrey.tumblr.com/). Thanks for reading!


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for another late update—a strong typhoon hit my country last Wednesday and our utilities were knocked out for two days. As I type this note, many of my fellow Filipinos still need help, so if you're able, please consider donating to any of the relief drives linked in these [twitter](https://twitter.com/MovePH/status/1326777657644765187) [threads](https://twitter.com/pagkapit/status/1326744705401413632), or in this [carrd](https://helptheph.carrd.co/).
> 
> Thank you—and now, on with our story.

Kylo led her to the Great Cabin— _his_ cabin, which he’d apparently turned into a library. 

Shelves stuffed full of books lined the wooden walls. A neat desk, holding a sheaf of papers and a case of pens, stood at the far end of the cabin by the windows. Curious artifacts stood atop the shelves or on little stands placed around the cabin. Rey saw astrolabes and puzzle boxes and compasses, and other things of brass and copper and wood that she couldn’t have named if she tried. 

“This is incredible,” she breathed. She felt like she had walked into a life-sized treasure chest, and her fingers twitched with curiosity and delight. 

“Thank you,” Kylo replied, a note of hesitant pleasure in his voice. 

“Where did you get all this?” 

“From the shipwrecks.”

Rey froze, her finger poised to trace the delicate rings of an astrolabe. How many ships must he have sunk and plundered to fill this one room?

Seemingly oblivious to her inner turmoil, Kylo continued, “The Knights took the gold and jewels and all that frippery. I preferred these.” 

“Why?”

“I like to keep busy—you know what they say about idle minds.” A rustle of fabric, as if he’d shrugged. “No reason I can’t learn anything new, even if I am stuck on this damned ship.”

“‘Stuck on?’” Rey turned to face him. “You mean you can’t leave either?” 

He nodded stiffly. 

“Is that why you brought me onboard, then? To break your curse?” 

“No. I—” Kylo shoved a hand through his hair. “I didn’t plan this. Any of it.” At her incredulous look, he continued, “Do you know how many mortals have actually been on this ship for any amount of time before you? _None_. Not since—” He stopped, his jaw clenching against whatever revelation he’d nearly let slip. 

“Since…” Her eyes widened. “Since _you_?”

The look on his face was answer enough. 

Rey bit her lip, staring at him with mingled sympathy and horror. “What happened to you, Kylo Ren?”

His eyes darted over her face for a long, silent moment—and then he answered. 

He told her how the _Silencer_ had crept up on his uncle’s ship under the cover of night. 

The Knights had slaughtered his fellow apprentices easily. He alone had managed to put up something of a fight. It hadn’t been much—mostly evading the Knights’ attacks so that they hit each other instead of him. However, his tenacity had apparently been enough to catch Snoke’s attention.

The Old God had stretched out a hand, and he had felt himself yanked forward as though on an invisible string. The withered, claw-like fingers had closed around his throat, dragging him onto the _Silencer_ and forcing him to watch as a great bolt of lightning rent his uncle’s ship in two. 

Once onboard, Snoke had laid out his terms. Killing him would have been a terrible waste, he said, and so he offered him a contract: “Join me, and I will give you power and a purpose. I will make you immortal.” 

“Lesson one,” said Kylo, with a dark, faraway look in his eyes, “magic _always_ has a price. Snoke made me immortal and gave me power over the storms at sea—all for the low, low price of my soul.” He huffed bitterly. “Quite a bargain, don’t you think?”

“And you _agreed_?” Rey shook her head in disbelief. “Why didn’t you try to escape?” 

“Like you did?” he retorted. “Lesson two: not all gods are as tolerant as Maz or I. Snoke threatened to consume my soul—thus ending my existence—if I refused, and I promise you, he would have done it.” 

He abruptly fell silent, as if choking on his own words. His whole body thrummed with tension, the cords in his neck standing out and his jaw clenched tight as he fought for control. Clearly, Snoke had not been a kind master. 

After some time, he continued, “I meant to bide my time and escape once I was strong enough, but circumstances forced my hand. I led the Knights in a mutiny. We succeeded, but Snoke had already disposed of my soul—or, I suppose, the part of it he took.” His hand curled into a fist at his side, tight enough that the leather of his glove creaked in protest. “He cursed me as he died.”

“What was the curse?” Rey’s voice was hushed. 

He seemed to have forgotten she was there until she spoke. He drew in a shuddering breath and recited, “‘You are Kylo Ren, Storm-bringer, Death-dealer, and you shall not be free until your soul is made whole again. Until the sun sinks into the sea, until the Leviathan itself rises from the deep, this ship shall be your anchor and your prison. None aboard shall find rest on land, sea, or air. No one will help you, no one will come for you, for no mortal shall board the _Silencer_ and live.’” 

When he finished speaking, Rey turned over the words of the curse in her mind. It felt safer to dwell on that, rather than the uncomfortable possibility that this contrary, unfathomable man was just as much a prisoner as she was. Suddenly the library seemed less like a treasure hoard and more like an attempt to fill the silence and the loneliness. 

“Right,” she repeated. “Frankly, those terms sound impossible. I don’t see how we can break them with”—she gestured expansively at the fantastical room—“any of this.”

“More often than not, spells aren’t literal. There must be some lore in the books that could be useful.” He paused, and then continued, frustrated, “But I’ve studied every book and object in here for years. There’s _nothing_ in there.”

“Well, let me look anyway. A fresh pair of eyes might help.”

Kylo led her to one side of the library and immediately started picking out books, as if he already knew which ones to look for. She watched him curiously before looking at the titles before her—she recognized almost none of them. “Have you really read all of these?” she asked, tracing the neat leather spines with a finger. 

“Yes.” 

She gaped at him, reluctantly impressed. 

He shrugged around the books in his arms, a wry smirk tilting the corners of his mouth. “Doesn’t mean I understood them all.”

Rey snorted, grabbing a book or two at random to hide her answering smile. 

One of the books Kylo had selected was about a lord who killed his king. “Most of the action is driven by the witches’ prophecies,” he explained when she gave him an odd look. “The characters spend all their time either making them come true or trying to avoid them, only to realize that the prophecies don’t come true the way they expect. See?” 

He flipped to the relevant part and handed it to her, tapping the page with a gloved finger. “I tried coming up with similar ideas, in case Snoke’s curse worked the same way, but…” He shrugged, the nonchalance of the gesture unable to hide the bleakness in his eyes. 

He’d clearly been a diligent student, Rey thought as she studied the pages. Some passages were encircled, and the margins were filled with annotations ( _“sun? son? should I jump in the sea???”_ ) in small, careful handwriting. 

They spent the rest of that afternoon in the library, trading ideas back and forth. Kylo was surprisingly patient, and displayed— well, _almost_ none of the condescension she’d expected from someone so clearly educated. Rey guessed he was just glad to have someone to talk to—she doubted the Knights were willing to be his sounding boards.

It would have been almost companionable—if she hadn’t been reading about magic and curses, and seriously considering them as problems to be solved, rather than tales to lose herself in. Instead it was another reminder that she had under two moons to break a god’s dying curse, lest she die too. 

##  **🌀**

About a day or two later, Rey woke to the noise of rain battering her windowpanes. Curiosity won out—when else would she see a storm from within its eye?—and she snatched up her staff and went above deck.

It was strangely heady to stand so close to such fearsome forces of nature—the jagged, white-blue flash of lightning, the siren-shriek of the wind as it drove the whirling gray clouds onward—and know that they could not harm her. But then Rey saw the flame of Ap’lek’s hair swooping around another ship’s sails, the canvas tearing in her wake. She saw Kuruk’s fog creeping over the deck, heard the sailors’ screams as it curled up and around their legs. 

_Just like the_ Niima, Rey realized, with dawning horror, _and the_ Sunspear. _I have to do something, anything_ — 

She saw Kylo, as ever, standing alone on the deck, watching the Knights at their bloody work, and ran up to him. “They’ll die.” 

He didn’t look at her, his jaw tightening with suppressed emotion. “I know.”

“Call off the storm!”

“I _can’t_.” 

In desperation, she swung her staff at his head, and he sidestepped the blow. Shifting her grip, she moved to jab one of the daggers into his midsection. Kylo dodged once more, grasped the staff, and wrenched it sharply to the side. Rey stumbled, only just managing to save herself from falling face-first to the deck.

She righted herself and leveled a blade at him. Hurt flashed briefly across Kylo’s face, and— oh, _who_ was he to stare at her with such sad, dark eyes, to throw her off-kilter in a way she’d never been before? She didn’t know whether to hate him or herself more for it.

“Fight me, damn you,” she snarled, lunging forward.

He drew his broadsword from over his shoulder with a look of resignation. Then he parried her thrust and bore down, forcing her blade downward until it pointed at the deck. She twisted it free and leaped back—but the dagger, having only been tied to the staff, fell away. 

Rey scowled. She was now, essentially, left with a very crude spear. Still she pressed the attack, darting around Kylo, alternating between slashes and stabs with the lone dagger still tied to the staff and brutal, concussive swings with the blunt end. He, meanwhile, stood in place, barely moving as he turned her attacks aside. 

She noted distantly how he took care not to let his blade get stuck in the wood of her staff. Whenever she swung the blunt end at him, he always rotated his sword, deflecting with the flat of his blade. Each impact sent a jolt up Rey’s arms, and she felt the wood give a little more each time. 

He was _good_ , she realized. She had the perverse desire to provoke him even further, to make him lose control, even as her self-preservation instincts railed at her for a fool. 

Her eyes flickered briefly over his shoulder. The wind and the rain were dying down. 

Sensing an opening, Kylo slashed downward. Rey brought her staff up to block, and their blades crossed above her head. Her arms trembled with effort, and she stared up at him, the first prickles of fear creeping up her spine. _Oh—_

Then he pulled away. 

Before she could do more than blink at the sudden absence of pressure, he brought the hilt of his sword down onto her staff. The splintered wood gave way with a sharp crack. 

Rey cried out in dismay and leaped backward, out of his reach. But Kylo stood back, his sword held loosely at his side. “Enough.” 

Behind him, Rey could see that the storm had completely dissipated, and the other ship was limping away—badly damaged, but still afloat. She let her arms drop to her sides likewise, still clutching the broken halves of her staff, and breathed a quick sigh of relief. 

Kylo stared at her with something like awe, and Rey’s brow furrowed. “Why wouldn’t you stop?”

“I _cause_ storms, Rey.” He gestured around them—a violent, jerky motion. “I don’t have a choice. This is what Snoke made me. ‘Storm-bringer, Death-dealer,’ remember?”

She snorted. “Bollocks. You saved me, didn’t you?” 

“ _Did_ I?” he replied tightly. 

“I’m still here, and I still have a chance to get home. I seem fairly safe at the moment.” And it was _true_ , Rey realized. Kylo and the Knights had had every chance to harm her, even kill her, over the past few days—yet they had not. She might have been in danger simply by being a mortal walking among gods and monsters—but those on this ship, at least, would not harm her. 

“You have a choice,” she spat. “You’re more than this, but you choose not to be and you hide behind this curse to justify it!” She shook her head. “You really are a monster.”

Kylo nodded, a barely perceptible jerk of his chin. “Yes, I am.” 

That night, she heard him pacing his cabin above her, followed by a series of heavy thuds. Rey lay rigid in the dark, imagining Kylo toppling the tables in his library, sweeping the books onto the floor. Then there was a final, lighter thud—she thought, unbidden, that it sounded like knees hitting the floor—before all was silent. 

She closed her eyes, but still saw his pale, stoic face—belied by the quiver of his lip and the sheen of tears in his eyes. 

A monster would have gloated, would have reveled in the destruction. Snoke probably would have. The words of his curse reeked of hubris, and spite, and evil. She could well imagine such a being delighting in death and pain. 

But Kylo—

Kylo had looked utterly miserable. 

She rolled over and buried her face in her pillow. 

##  **🌀**

_This is a terrible idea_ , Rey told herself as she stood in front of Kylo’s door the next day. 

She had had no intention of seeking him out. But then she had gone topside and seen the Knights lounging about, while Kylo was nowhere to be found.

“And where is our esteemed captain?” Cato raised his arms, spine cracking and arching as he stretched. 

“Is he not in the crow's nest?” Ap’lek drawled. 

“No.” Ushar yawned. “He seems to be sulking even worse than usual, the dramatic twit.”

She might have called Kylo a monster, but in that moment Rey had realized that perhaps his crew deserved the name more. They had nearly killed a shipful of men yesterday—had succeeded in doing so for gods knew how long—yet now they were as languid and sated as cats in the sun. 

“He didn’t even take anything from the wreck this time,” Trudgen noted. 

“Well, there _was_ no wreck,” Kuruk pointed out. 

They all turned to look at Rey. She lifted her chin, refusing to be cowed. 

“It really does all come back to our little guest, doesn’t it?” Ap’lek mused. 

“The only thing that’s different here is _you_ ,” Vicrul agreed. 

Trudgen jerked his chin at her. “Why’s he all hung up on you anyway? What’s so special about you?”

Rey’s mouth opened and closed soundlessly. “Nothing,” she said at last, shaking her head. “I don’t know. I’m no one special.” 

Ap’lek arched an eyebrow. “Ren seems to think otherwise.” 

That was what had led her back here. 

There was no sound from within Kylo’s cabin—none of the thumps and crashes she’d heard the night before. She wavered for a moment, biting her lip, before shaking herself. This was ridiculous—hadn’t she wounded him and fought him to a standstill? He might have been a god, but neither was she entirely helpless against him. 

Rey lifted her hand and rapped twice, decisively. After a moment of silence and some shuffling inside, the door swung open. 

She couldn’t stifle a quiet gasp at the sight of Kylo so obviously wretched. His hair was a mess, sticking up at odd angles like he’d been running his hands through it—or pulling it—constantly. His clothes were rumpled, and the shadows under his eyes had deepened. “Come to see the monster in his den?” 

“The Knights were worried. They haven’t seen you since yesterday.”

“Liar,” he said flatly. “They would have come and dragged me out themselves if they were.” He twitched, as if he meant to lean in closer and had stopped himself at the last moment. “What are you doing here, Rey?”

 _I wanted to see if you were all right,_ she thought. But the words sat awkwardly on her tongue, and she stared mutely up at him as she tried to think of some other logical excuse. 

Yet something of it must still have shown on her face, because Kylo’s lips parted in surprise. Something fragile and wary flashed in his eyes, a muscle spasming briefly beneath the left one. 

Then the hint of vulnerability vanished as quickly as it had appeared. “Spare me your pity,” he snarled, so viciously that Rey half-expected his teeth to sharpen into fangs. “You’ve made your opinion of me quite clear, and I will not grovel at your feet to soothe your guilty conscience.” 

She drew back as if slapped. “You— you’re _insufferable_! I don’t know why I even bothered!” Whirling on her heel, she stormed away. Her eyes began to sting, and she blinked furiously to clear them. _It’s just the sea air_. 

“Sounds exciting,” Cato commented, watching Rey clatter through the hatch and vanish below deck.

Vicrul sighed. “Are you really so bored you’d stoop to meddling in Ren’s love life?”

“Yes,” said Trudgen.

Ap’lek shrugged unrepentantly. “You have to admit, this is the most amusing thing to happen this century.” 

Rey did not try to approach him again. She discarded the broken halves of her staff, keeping only the daggers she had pilfered. She tried to practice with them—spinning and throwing, mainly—as best she could, but was forced to admit that her cabin didn’t have enough room. 

So she went back topside, but kept entirely to herself, her back turned pointedly toward Kylo’s cabin. Whenever the Knights glanced archly between her and Kylo’s tightly shut door, she gritted her teeth and slashed at the air even more furiously. 

“ _Children,_ ” Kuruk scoffed. 

Ushar rubbed her temples. “Gods above, this is excruciating.” 

🌀

One day, the ship rocked—not the tempestuous motion of being tossed in a rough sea, but rather a rhythmic nudging. The Knights looked at each other, puzzled, and even Kylo emerged from his cabin. “What is that?”

In answer, a giant head rose up out of the sea beside the ship—a sea serpent, its body as thick around as the ship was tall, its smooth, dark skin shining faintly greenish. A row of spikes ran the length of its back, and a frill of similarly spiked tentacles hung at rest just underneath its blunt head. It stared down at them, whining low in its throat in the way of all wary, curious animals. 

“Oh, gods,” Rey whispered. 

“A Leviathan,” Vicrul breathed. 

Trudgen was somewhat less impressed. “Shoo.” He leaped into the air and drove a fist into the underside of the serpent’s jaw, and the deck trembled with the resulting thunderclap. 

The Leviathan cried out, high and pained, and reared back. Its frill stiffened, the tentacles now forming a sort of spiky halo around its head. Its jaw unhinged to reveal no less than three rows of serrated teeth, each as long as the _Silencer_ ’s mainmast. Its head shot across the deck, and everyone scattered out of its way.

“It’s trying to coil around the ship,” Kylo realized. “Stop it!” He swung an arm across his body, and a gale-force wind sprang up, sending the Leviathan’s head and neck skidding towards the stern. 

The Knights joined the fray, battering it with thunder and wind and lightning. However, the Leviathan simply shook them all off. It reared up again and swooped down with its jaws open, now intending to crush the ship into splinters. On the other side of the ship, a spiked tail rose from the water, curving down towards the deck while everyone was distracted with the head. 

Rey drew one of her daggers and slashed at it as it descended. The tail writhed in pain and hurriedly withdrew, and she allowed herself a giddy grin. 

The Leviathan shrieked, and she glanced over her shoulder. On the other side of the deck, Kylo and the Knights continued to bring the storm down upon the Leviathan’s head. _Why won’t it leave?_

Then the serpent keened again, and Rey realized that it didn’t just sound angry—it sounded pained. 

When it lifted itself further out of the water, she saw why. A large, serrated tooth was embedded about midway down its body, the wound weeping bright green blood. Fighting to keep her balance as the ship rocked, she rushed up to Kylo. “Stop! You’re only making it angrier!”

He glanced at her incredulously. “Any brilliant suggestions, sweetheart?”

She grabbed his arm and pointed at the tooth. “Look!” Realization flashed across his face, and she nodded. “We need to get it within reach.” 

Rey stuck her fingers in her mouth and whistled sharply. The Leviathan turned towards the new sound, its head cocking in what might have been surprise. “Oi!" She waved her arms wildly above her head. "Over here! Come down a minute, will you?”

It did so, its jaws open wide enough to snap her up in a single mouthful. 

A bolt of lightning forced its head down and away, the entire upper half of its body now stretched out over the deck. “Reckless little fool,” Kylo panted. “You could’ve been killed—” 

“But I wasn’t,” Rey said, “and now I can pull out that tooth.” She rushed forward and immediately began prying it loose. 

The Leviathan cried out and twisted, its head sliding along the deck to snap at her. 

Kylo blasted it away once more. “Pin the beast’s head down,” he commanded the Knights as he ran to Rey’s side. 

“Aye, aye, _Captain_ ,” Cato grumbled, throwing off a sloppy salute. 

Rey glanced up in surprise when a pair of black-gloved hands appeared beside hers, pulling and tugging with equal effort. Kylo met her gaze, and they nodded in wordless accord before continuing to pry the tooth out of the Leviathan’s hide. More than once, their hands slipped on the serpent’s blood, and it thrashed and squealed in pain. “Hurry _up!”_ yelled Ushar, her voice taut with effort.

When the tooth was finally out, it took a moment for the Leviathan to register the absence of pain. Then it stilled, and Rey mopped at her brow with the back of her hand. “I think you can let go now,” she called to the Knights. 

Slowly, the Leviathan withdrew into the sea until only its head remained above the water, staring at Rey and Kylo with bright black eyes. Kylo tensed, but Rey stretched out her hand. “Hello there,” she crooned, walking towards it with slow, careful steps. “That must have hurt a lot, yeah? Well, it’s all right now. We won’t hurt you anymore. Please don’t hurt us either.”

The Leviathan tilted its head to one side, considering her. Slowly, it dipped its head in a passable imitation of a nod. Then, with that same dignity, it sank back into the depths until not even a ripple was left.

“Incredible,” Kylo said—softly, almost reverently.

Rey turned to him. “It was hurt,” she answered pointedly. “It didn’t need more pain. It needed help.”

His breath hitched, and he stared at her, wary and hopeful all at once. Rey leaned in closer, only half-aware that she did so. 

“As touching as this all is,” Kuruk broke in, making both Rey and Kylo jump and turn away from each other almost guiltily, “may I point out that the Leviathan rose from the deep?”

“As stated in the terms of Snoke’s curse?” Vicrul added. 

Rey’s eyes widened. “Gods, they’re _right._ ”

“One term down,” Kylo agreed. “Two more to go.” 

“We have work to do.” She hesitated for only a moment before stretching out a hand. “Truce?”

He gazed at her hand for another long, silent moment before clasping it and giving it a firm shake. “Truce.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you liked this, please don't forget to leave a comment or kudos, or come say hi on [twitter](https://twitter.com/niennathegrey) or [tumblr](niennathegrey.tumblr.com). Thanks for reading!


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the hiatus—update schedules are no match for out-of-whack mental health. To make up for it, I'll be posting Chapter 6 in a couple of days.
> 
> And now, back to our story!

“You said spells and curses usually weren’t literal,” Rey mused, righting a table. Distantly, she noted the contrast between extraordinary and prosaic—fending off a sea serpent attack one moment and cleaning up after it the next. “That seemed plenty literal.” 

“Yes, well, I suppose it really is a toss-up. I thought the sunset might count as ‘the sun sinking into the sea.’” Kylo frowned as he slotted books back into their shelves. “But no. That would have been too easy.” 

He glanced at Rey. “Any ideas for how to make the sun actually sink into the sea?" he asked, almost jokingly. 

She froze, struck by a sudden thought. “Actually… I think you might already have.”

“What?”

“Where’s that book you showed me? About the lord who kills his king?” She found it on the floor and turned to the relevant page. “It’s like the wood coming to the castle. My ship—it was named the _Sunspear_.” She looked at him slowly. “And you sank it.”

Realization dawned on Kylo’s face, and he drew in a sharp breath. 

“Is that why you did it?" Rey asked with forced calmness. “To break the curse?"

“No,” he said instantly, stepping towards her. “No, Rey, I swear it. I didn’t even know what your ship was called until just now.”

Rey had lived among thieves and pirates all her life— _was_ one herself. She knew how to spot a liar—and for all his faults, Kylo was no liar. His face was far too expressive. She relaxed fractionally and nodded. “Then you didn’t bring me aboard to break your curse either?”

“Also no. That was a bonus.”

“Then _why_? Why did you save me? I—” She began again, as if the words were being dragged from her. “I’m out of my depth. I don’t know anything about magic or curses. I’m just a girl with a stick.” _A broken stick, now_. 

There it was—the same fascination she’d seen the day he brought her onboard. “Because you called out to me, even as I destroyed your ship,” he said, low and secret like a confession. “You saw me and didn’t run. Why?”

“Because I’d seen you before.” As Kylo’s eyes widened once more, Rey explained, “You wrecked my previous ship, too. The _Niima,_ captained by Unkar Plutt.” 

“I’m sorry.” He looked stricken, his jaw working in the way she’d come to recognize as his clearest emotional tell. 

Rey stared at him a moment longer, unsure which was more surprising: Kylo’s remorse, or the fact that she had, somehow, learned to read him so easily over such a short acquaintance. Then, shaking her head, she replied, “Don’t be.” 

He didn’t answer, and she knew she’d surprised him. Looking down at where her knuckles were white around a figurine, she continued, “Plutt was a bastard and life on his ship was the pits. He’s no loss.” 

“Your father?” He sounded disturbed. 

Her head snapped up. “ _No._ Only a guardian. My parents left me with him.” 

He frowned, and she rushed on, feeling oddly defensive. “They said they’d come back for me.”

“But if his ship is destroyed now—”

“All the more reason to break the curse so I can go home and they can find me.” 

She felt the weight of his probing gaze upon her, but kept resolutely silent. Thankfully, he took the hint, and they continued putting the library to rights in almost-companionable silence. By the time they had finished, the sun was setting, painting the room in shades of red and gold. 

“Another day gone.” Rey glanced up at him. “Now what?”

“How do you feel about dinner?”

It was a harmless enough question—but Kylo was oddly tense, his whole body rigid in a way that suggested that he was trying very hard not to fidget. _What’s his problem— oh!_ Her eyes widened, and she blurted gracelessly, “With you?” 

“Don’t get too excited,” he said, the dryness of his voice at odds with the faint dusting of pink along his cheekbones. “We’re allies now, aren’t we? It’s a gesture of goodwill, nothing more.” 

She arched an eyebrow. “Done this a lot, have you?” 

To her surprise, he hunched in on himself a little and looked down at the floor, making a face that, on any other person, she would have called a frustrated sort of pout.

How was it that a man who commanded storms and faced down sea serpents without flinching could be so flustered by asking a woman to dine with him? It was so ridiculous, so unexpectedly charming, so… _human_ that Rey couldn’t help smiling—briefly, but widely, her nose crinkling with it. “Dinner sounds good.”

His head snapped back up, eyes wide. “Oh. Good.” 

Then she saw the Leviathan’s blood streaking her arms and hands. A quick glance down at herself showed that her borrowed tunic was similarly covered in splatters of lurid green. Leia’s etiquette lessons reasserted themselves, and she added, rather sheepishly, “I might change first, though.” 

Changing clothes, however, meant having to approach Ap’lek—and by extension, the other Knights. Rey went to the crew’s quarters with the grim resolve of one walking into the lion’s den. “I’m having dinner with Kylo,” she blurted as they all turned to stare at her in the doorway. “My clothes are all bloody and I have nothing else to wear. Please can I borrow something again?” 

Trudgen smirked, the expression more amused than menacing. “Ah, our resident ray of sunshine. Hey, Ap’lek,” he yelled over his shoulder, “lend her a gown, will you?”

“No.” 

“Please?” Rey bit her lip. “I’ll— I’ll help you fix the ship.”

After a long, silent moment, during which Rey tried her best not to fidget under the other woman’s gaze, Ap’lek motioned her inside. “That’s better.”

Rey watched as the redhead threw a trunk open and rifled through it before carefully extracting a bundle of gauzy gray fabric. “Here.”

Even to Rey’s untrained eyes, the gown was beautiful, in an understated sort of way. She could probably wear it without feeling too much like a child playing dress-up. “Where’d you get this? I mean—” She glanced sidelong at Ap’lek, unsure how to continue without offending her. 

“Sometimes, sunshine,” the redhead said sagely, “a woman wants to look beautiful just because she _can._ Doesn’t mean I don’t also know twenty different ways to kill you and dispose of the body.” 

Cato snorted. “Don’t let her fool you. She likes to dress up for Vicrul sometimes too.”

“Shut up.” Ap’lek flicked a hand in his direction, and Cato laughed as he batted the resulting funnel cloud away. 

Watching them, Rey felt a sudden pang of homesickness. For all their fearsomeness, in that moment the Knights weren’t much different from her crew heckling each other on the _Sunspear_. There really was a sort of camaraderie among them—one that apparently didn’t include Kylo. 

She thought of him in his cabin with only his books for company as the Knights laughed and caroused down below, and something twinged uncomfortably within her. 

🌀 

A burst of muffled voices, punctuated by a crack of laughter, sounded outside his door. As Kylo stood up to investigate, the door swung open and Rey hurried into the cabin. 

She was in a _dress_. A simple, sleeveless pearl-gray dress—not much different from the tunic she’d been wearing earlier, except that the pleated sashes crossing over her chest were longer and the belt was adorned with tasteful gems, while the skirt fell to the floor in a becoming flare. 

Kylo felt rather like he’d been hit by a bolt of his own lightning. 

Rey lifted her hand in a shy half-wave. “Hi.”

“Hello,” he responded automatically. Then it slipped out: “You look lovely.” 

She fidgeted a little, fingers twisting in the dress’s gauzy folds. There was nothing coy or teasing about the gesture, which he found oddly endearing. “It’s Ap’lek’s; I’m giving it back later. Did you know she likes to dress up?”

He had _not_ known this, and Kylo was momentarily thrown by the thought of the hard-bitten wind spirit cooing over dresses. Then Rey’s stomach grumbled, and he hastily gestured at the table. “Please, sit.”

She did so, blinking when he pulled her chair out for her. “What’s for dinner?”

“Well—” Kylo rubbed the back of his neck abashedly. He’d tried to make something a bit fancier out of their rather limited provisions. But at the end of the day, it was still fish stew and bread, and he’d only ever cooked out of necessity, never to impress. “Honestly, it’s really just more of the same.” 

Rey smiled politely. “I’m sure it’s fine.”

They ate in awkward silence, stealing glances at each other between bites. The stew was, frankly, passable at best, but Rey devoured it, even using her bread to sop up the last traces of sauce in her bowl. Kylo wanted to say something, _anything_ —but what could he say that wasn't either horribly morbid or completely banal?

Thankfully, Rey cracked first. “I’m really not very good at this socializing thing,” she said, wrinkling her nose. 

“Yeah, me too,” he agreed dryly. “Polite conversation seems inane after slashing your dinner companion’s face open.” 

She laughed—a short, surprised burst of sound—and Kylo’s lips twitched hesitantly upwards. “True.” A pause. “ _Could_ I have killed you then?”

“No.” It wasn’t arrogance—merely fact. She was a mortal, and he was a god. “Why, do you still want to?”

“Not at the moment, no,” she replied, equally seriously. “Maybe in a day or two.” 

He snorted, raising his glass to her. “If it’s any consolation, if I were still mortal, you probably could. You fight well.”

Her mouth fell slightly open and her eyes darted briefly to her empty bowl. Then she looked up at him and nodded graciously, her cheeks dusted with a rather becoming flush. “Thanks.” 

“Why a staff? It’s an unconventional choice.”

“It’s what I’m used to.” Rey shrugged. “For most of my life, I wouldn’t have been able to get hold of a sword or pistol. But a stick? Oh, broom and mop handles were fine in a pinch. I just… improved my technique as I got older, I suppose.” She frowned. “I miss my old staff, though.”

“You seem to have improvised well enough.” His hands flexed at the memory of their duel in the storm, the ferocity with which she’d attacked him. 

She grimaced. “Until you split it in half.” 

“Take a weapon from the hold, then.” 

Rey’s eyes roamed over his face, looking for the catch in his offer. “Really?”

“Yes. Gods know the Knights have more than enough that they don’t use down there. There’s bound to be an axe or halberd or something to suit your tastes.” 

She wanted to agree—he saw it in the side-to-side flicker of her eyes, weighing pragmatism and independence. At last, she said, “All right.” Then, in a rush: “Will you spar with me tomorrow?” 

He stared at her in surprise, and she continued, “I have to get the feel of a new weapon somehow, don’t I? And frankly, I don’t trust the Knights to not use magic.”

It took him a moment to recognize the feeling building within him as anticipation. “As you wish.” 

Negotiations apparently concluded, Rey stood up and started clearing the table. Kylo hurriedly scraped his chair back. “Let me—” 

“I don’t mind.” Rey flashed a quick smile. “Not a dainty-fine noblewoman, remember? I’m not afraid of a few dirty dishes. Besides”—and now there was an edge of mischief in her grin—“ _you’re_ supplying the water.” 

Kylo did, in fact, occasionally use his powers in such mundane ways. He’d never felt anything, one way or the other, when he did. But now they went back to the galley, and he conjured a small rain cloud so Rey could clean the dishes, and it felt— right. 

_Domestic_ , almost. 

“See you tomorrow, then?” Rey asked as they finished. 

He nodded. “Tomorrow morning on deck.” Then he added quietly, “Sleep well, Rey.” 

She looked at him for a long, silent moment. Then: “Good night, Kylo.”

##  **🌀**

The next morning, Rey, after much deliberation, chose a glaive from the Knights’ cache of weapons. When she emerged from the hold, she found Kylo standing alone amidships and the Knights lounging about on the rear decks, their curiosity and anticipation palpable even at a distance.

Rey went to stand opposite him. “Morning.”

Kylo nodded. “Ready?”

In answer, she slid her right foot back and leveled the glaive at him. He drew his broadsword from over his shoulder with a quick twirl, as if in salute. Then they lunged at each other. 

Their duel in the storm had only been a few days ago, but there was something… different now. At first, Rey moved cautiously as she got used to the glaive, but Kylo didn’t seem inclined to hold back. Where before he had merely been defending himself, now he pressed the attack, forcing her backward as she deflected his slashes and stabs. 

Rey grinned, her blood singing in her veins as they moved up and down the deck, her glaive and his sword clashing and whirling through the air. Kylo didn’t smile back, but she could feel his exhilaration in the way he moved, the vigor with which he parried her strikes. 

Finally, Rey managed to twist Kylo’s sword out of his hands. Before she could step out of range, he grabbed the haft of her glaive and wrenched it away. Now both weaponless, they stood for a moment longer before simultaneously relaxing their stances. 

Rey was dimly aware of the Knights whooping and hollering in the distance. Kylo’s eyes were bright and warm upon her, the faint traces of a smile hovering around his mouth. “Well fought.” 

She knew she was a good fighter—Leia, Han, and her crew had all acknowledged as much, and often too. But their praise had never made her feel this strange fluttering in her stomach—the same thing she’d felt when Kylo complimented her last night. Rey made a tiny shake of her head, willing herself to _get a grip_. “Thanks,” she said, uncomfortably aware of the breathy note in her voice. “We should probably get to work now, though.”

She turned and headed for the library, barely waiting for Kylo to fall into step behind her. Once inside, she dropped onto the thick rug and folded her legs underneath her. “So the sun’s sunk into the sea and the Leviathan’s risen from the deep. What’s left?”

“‘Until your soul is made whole again.’” Kylo frowned.

Rey blinked. “Well, what do we have on that?” 

Again, he knew exactly which books to look for. “There are stories about sorcerers living eternally because their souls—or hearts, or lives; there are different versions—were separated from their bodies somehow.” 

He’d annotated those, too, and Rey didn’t know whether she was more interested in _those_ or in the stories themselves. Some were serious and academic: in a book about a wizard who’d traded his heart for magic and eternal life, Kylo had listed similar stories, comparing different methods of breaking magical contracts. Others were more irreverent—in one about a sorcerer from Takobo who hid his life in an egg, Kylo had written _“Cruel and unusual._ ” 

“An _egg_?” Rey made a face. “Why would you put your life somewhere so fragile?” 

Kylo’s lips twitched. “Good point. Although, to be fair, the egg was inside other things first.”

“I hope you’re not saying we should kill every single rabbit we see and check if there’s a live duck inside.”

“Well, I don’t think we’ll be seeing any rabbits anytime soon, so that won’t be necessary.” 

The stories were all new to her, and she lingered over the words, fascinated. Kylo, however, turned over the pages mechanically, like he’d read them a thousand times before and no longer looked to them for hope. 

“You must have been rich,” Rey said suddenly. “Before all this, I mean.”

He raised an eyebrow. “What makes you say that?” 

“Only rich people have time for”—she waved a hand at the room—“hobbies.” 

“You sound like my father.” 

The casual admission threw Rey off guard, and Kylo continued, with a wry twist of his mouth, "But you're not wrong. If I'd had my way, I would have been a scholar."

She could see it—him sitting in a cavernous room, half-hidden behind tall stacks of books, contentedly scribbling notes on pieces of parchment, perhaps absently nibbling on the end of a pen. She felt a sudden surge of sympathy for him—for the perverseness of his fate. “I believe you.” 

##  **🌀**

Rey dreamed of Alderaan that night.

The royal couple stood in the throne room. Leia’s mouth was a tight, bloodless line, her eyes bright with tears she refused to let fall. Han shook his head sharply and looked off to the side, rubbing a hand roughly over his jaw. 

There was a muted click, like a door closing. Instantly, Leia turned to Han and said, “Gods, not _again_.” Her face crumpled, then, and he drew her to him as she began to shake with sobs. 

Then she saw Finn and Rose speaking with Captain Poe Dameron. She couldn’t hear their voices—but Finn and Rose looked weary yet determined, while Poe shook his head as he paced back and forth. Finally, he turned back to them, holding up a finger—in accusation? Emphasis?—and opened his mouth to speak, but the dream changed again before she heard him. 

Now Finn and Rose were in a skiff, nothing but unbroken blue sea around them. She furled the sail as he took up the oars, while behind them, dark clouds rolled across the sky— 

—and Rey’s eyes snapped open. 

She ought to have been comforted—there was a time when she would have given anything to see a familiar face. Instead she just felt unsettled, antsy. _I need air._

She was halfway up through the hatch leading up to the deck when she saw Kylo standing at the gunwale and staring down at the water.

Rey gasped—and he heard her. 

As he began to turn around, she ducked below deck again, feeling unaccountably like she’d been caught doing something she shouldn’t. 

Back inside her cabin, and with no other recourse, Rey paced the floor. She made herself dizzy tracing and retracing the length and breadth of the room, but she still wasn’t _tired_. With a resigned sigh, she flopped back into bed.

Above her, she heard Kylo pacing his cabin, and then the scrape of chair legs across the floor. The sound was oddly comforting—a sign that she wasn’t the only one awake in the silence and the darkness, with nothing but her thoughts to keep her company. 

_Maybe they_ are _looking for me,_ she thought, trying to take some solace in the idea. _Leia still thinks her son is alive because they never found his body. Maybe she’ll wait for me too._

 _Or_ , countered a cold little voice, _they’ll honor you for dying in naval service, give you a big, fancy ceremony—then forget you the moment they carve your name on a headstone._

She fell asleep to these thoughts, circling her mind like vultures— 

—and woke to the mid-morning sun, shining full and golden in her face through a gap in the clouds around the _Silencer_. 

Rey panicked, an instinct borne of years and years of having to wake with the sun _or else._ She dressed as quickly as she could and burst into the library. “I’m late, I know—”

Kylo looked at her, startled, from where he sat at his desk. “Late?” he repeated. “No, you’re fine. You can sleep as long as you please.” 

She blinked owlishly at him, resisting the urge to slump in relief. “Well, it won’t happen again.”

But she was distracted for much of the day, and at length Kylo asked her hesitantly, “Are you all right?” 

“Yes, fine.” Rey waved a hand dismissively. “Couldn’t sleep last night, that’s all.” She saw his brow furrow, and quickly changed the subject. “I was wondering—the Leviathan rising _was_ literal, but my ship sinking wasn’t really. Maybe the bit about your soul is like that too?” 

He made a _go on_ sort of gesture, and an embarrassingly long pause ensued before she shook her head. “Never mind. Maybe we really do need to sail around until we find some ridiculously hard-to-reach island.” She sighed and rubbed her temples. 

“I’ve thought of that,” he replied bleakly. “I’ve searched every gods-forsaken sandbar and spit of rock I can reach, and— _nothing._ ” 

“Then Snoke must have put it somewhere you can’t reach—somewhere landlocked?”

He laughed once, without humor. “Just so. And then what? All this will have been for nothing.” 

Kylo suddenly threw the book in his hands to the floor. Then, his fit of temper not yet exhausted, he leaped up, strode to the nearest shelf, and drove his fist against it. The wood quivered, spilling a few books onto the floor. He leaned his forehead against his upraised arm, and Rey could hear his ragged breathing even from her seat on the rug. 

“I should have left you where you were,” he mumbled. 

Rey flinched. She couldn’t deny thinking the same thing herself a handful of times over the past few days—so why did it hurt to hear him say it now? “Then I would have still died,” she answered, as evenly as she could. “Sooner rather than later, but dead all the same.”

He whirled to face her, desperate and guilty. “You don’t know that.”

“I already survived one shipwreck. No one’s lucky enough to survive two,” she pointed out. “I would rather take my chances with you than the sea itself.” She saw the mingled disbelief and wonder on his face, and added quietly, “It isn’t too late.” 

God though he was, in that moment he looked as if _she_ had granted _him_ a boon. Warmth blossomed in Rey’s chest, and she had to look away. Blessing the presence of the book in her lap, she promptly opened it, flipping back to the beginning. 

She heard Kylo sit down again after a few minutes, but by then, she really was engrossed in the book—or rather, his annotations. She’d seen them before, but had skimmed over the ones that didn’t look like notes on the curse’s terms. Now that she was paying more attention, she saw that some of them were, in fact, achingly personal. 

One passage read, “I am in blood / Stepped in so far that should I wade no more, / Returning were as tedious as go o’er.” Kylo had underlined it multiple times, almost to the point of tearing through the paper. Beside it, he’d written, in the same forceful hand, _Oh, to have enough of a choice that even the possibility of turning away could be called tedious._

At the top of one scene, about halfway through: _If I had to be like him in anything, I would rather it be this. Perhaps even ruin and death would be tolerable if shared with the right person. (But would it not also be evil to subject anyone else to this curséd half-life?)_

Her breath caught in her throat, and she glanced up to where his dark head bent over a page. _He’s so alone._

She rubbed her eyes, put the book aside, and reached for another. But the words blurred and swam before her eyes, and her head nodded over the page even as she tried to hold it up.

She had the vague, dreamy impression of a large, warm hand on her shoulder—of being lifted carefully, and her cheek rubbing against fine fabric. 

When she woke, she was alone in the library, and the sun was low in the sky. Also, she was in Kylo’s chair—and his coat was draped over her. Rey’s fingers curled into the black cloth. 

It was warm, and smelled faintly of petrichor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [What's a glaive?](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glaive)
> 
> Thank you to [Erulisse17](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Erulisse17/pseuds/Erulisse17) for suggesting [Rey's dinner dress](https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/688064207618572417/715655365919768699/unknown.png)! 
> 
> If you liked this, please don't forget to leave a comment or kudos, or come say hi on [twitter](https://twitter.com/niennathegrey) or [tumblr](niennathegrey.tumblr.com). Thanks for reading!


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ... So, this _didn't_ go up as soon as I expected, BUT I hope the content of the chapter makes up for it?

Slowly, so naturally that neither of them realized it, they fell into a routine.

Despite what Kylo had said, Rey still woke with the sun. Now, though, she did not wake to the soul-crushing awareness of being a— a _slave_ on a rickety pile of a ship, nor even to the mental load of being a captain and having to supervise her own ship and crew. She woke to the realization that there was, in fact, nothing she _absolutely had_ to do. 

It frightened her at first. Then she got used to it, and it began to feel like a gift to wake.

She went up on deck, or into the crow’s nest, to watch the sun climb higher over the water. It wasn’t sleep, but it was just as peaceful, if not more so. For the first time in her life, Rey could simply _feel_ the sunlight on her face, smell the sea air, and think of nothing at all. 

More often than not, however, her gaze strayed to Kylo’s cabin. The door was, invariably, tightly closed, and she wondered if he were always sleepless, if he always paced his cabin to and fro in the dead of night. 

Unbidden, she imagined him asleep in his chair, a book in his lap and his neck at an uncomfortable angle, or perhaps at his desk, his arms folded on the wood and his dark head buried in them—the involuntary, exhausted sleep of someone who’d tried and failed to stay up all night. 

She hoped not. For all she told herself he was a grown man and didn’t need her fussing over him, she couldn’t help a pang of sympathy at the thought of him running himself so ragged.

When the sun burned away the morning mist, she ate a quick breakfast in the galley. There were more provisions now, fine foodstuffs she’d rarely had the chance to stock even on her old ships. She’d asked Kylo about it once, and he’d said gruffly, “Maz. Sometimes she sends the seabirds to us with food.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Rey had seen him glance at her and rub the back of his neck. The gesture had been startlingly boyish, and a small, hopeful voice inside her had whispered, _For me?_ even as she’d told herself not to be stupid, that for all she knew Maz had been supplying the _Silencer_ long before she ever boarded. 

Then she spent the rest of the morning and most of the afternoon in the library, and— 

—and she’d be lying if she said she didn’t enjoy it: the both of them seated cross-legged on the rug, piles of books around them, something tentative and warm and companionable growing between them. Reading Kylo’s annotations had made her rather bold, and now her comments as she read were artless, irreverent observations on the stories themselves as often as they were serious ideas on some aspect of magic. 

Sometimes, she even managed to make him smile, or laugh—such as he ever did. It was really more of a twitch of the mouth, or a breathy huff—but even so, there was such a gleam—warm, guileless, _alive—_ in his eyes when he did that Rey felt a thrill, much like the feeling of finding unexpectedly valuable cargo. 

It took them a week or so to finish most of the books that Kylo had deemed _specifically_ related to the breaking of the curse. Rey then insisted on reading the rest in case he’d missed something in those—while she really did think they might find some unexpectedly helpful tidbit in there, she was also truly curious about what else he had tucked away in this arcane, extraordinary room. 

“What’s your favorite book?” she asked one day.

It was a simple question—yet Kylo looked at her like she spoke a foreign language, like he’d long lost track of the concept of _favorites,_ or even of liking and disliking. 

Her heart ached for him, and she continued, softer, “Surely you must have read some of these for fun.”

After a moment’s hesitation, the muscle under his left eye twitching with some suppressed emotion, he handed her a book—gilt-edged, bound in blue leather. “This one.” Almost shyly, he added, “It was always my favorite, even… before.” 

Rey took it back to her cabin at the end of the day. The book was an epic about a king sailing home from a great war, and all the (mis)adventures he had on the way. It took him ten years to come home, but come home he did, to the joy of his wife, son, and people.

She could see why he liked it so much. 

It wasn’t just that, though, was it? The king was a mighty warrior, but most of all he was renowned for his cleverness—and was that not Kylo, too, warrior and scholar in one? 

“I know this story, actually,” she said when she returned the book. “Well, sort of. There was a lady at court who wrote a version about the witch.”

Kylo tilted his head. “Oh?” 

Rey told him the story, feeling absurdly proud of being able to tell _him_ something new. “Makes sense, yeah? I mean, she wouldn’t curse people for no reason—” She stopped, remembering who she was talking to and why they were here in the first place. 

Thankfully, he didn’t seem to notice her blunder. “What else do you like to read?” 

When she mentioned a few more of her favorites—the god of love and his wife, the snow queen, the wandering princeling—he said thoughtfully, “Fairytales.” 

“Go on, you can laugh,” she muttered, looking down at where her fingers worried a loose thread on the rug. 

“They suit you.” His voice was warm, edging dangerously close to fond, and Rey’s heart stuttered at the thought of that gleam in his eyes as he looked at her. 

_Sometimes I feel like_ I’m _in a fairytale_ , she wanted to say. She definitely had the cursed prince to save, at least. 

In the late afternoons, before the sun set, they sparred on deck, to stretch their legs after the long hours of reading. This was a pleasure too, in its own way—to swing and slash as ferociously as she could and not worry about hurting him. 

Watching him was a large part of that pleasure. Kylo moved like some large apex predator—not graceful, exactly, but powerful and mesmerizing nonetheless. It sent a thrill of _something_ running down her spine every time their blades clashed. 

_Adrenaline_ , she told herself. 

He called her _sunshine_ once—it just slipped out in the middle of a bout. She aimed a thrust at his leg, then slammed the haft into his chin as he parried. He drew back, rubbing his jaw, and gave her a lopsided smirk. “Not bad, sunshine.”

Rey had heard the same old, tired “Rey of sunshine” joke for nearly as long as she could remember, sighing and rolling her eyes each time. But it was so _unexpected_ coming from Kylo that she faltered in the middle of a lunge. “What?” 

Suddenly he looked sheepish, either at his own slip or at throwing her off. “It’s what the Knights call you, isn’t it?” 

Rey snorted, but couldn’t quite stop the small smile that spread across her face. “They need better puns.”

He smirked—an expression which quickly faltered when her next slash caught him across the chest even as he dodged. 

She promptly dropped the glaive and rushed to him. “Oh, gods, are you all right?” 

“Yeah,” he grunted. “You just caught my shirt, that’s all.” 

She leaned in closer to examine him, instinctively putting a hand out to steady herself. His shirt was torn, but there was no telltale red line or beading of blood against the pale skin underneath. She breathed a quiet sigh of relief, then froze as she realized _where exactly_ her hand rested. 

She was touching his chest—his broad, very solid chest, warm even through the fabric of his shirt. 

His heart thumped beneath her palm. 

“Oh,” she said aloud, yanking her hand back like she’d been burned—and they hadn’t even been sparring _that_ long, why was she breathless? “Er, sorry about your shirt. Give it to me, I’ll mend it.”

“Now?” He sounded breathless too.

“ _No,_ I mean—” Now she was _blushing_. Very mature. “Just, just give it to me after you get changed. I’ll go find a needle and thread.” 

As she fled— no, _went back—_ to her cabin to do so, she heard the Knights laughing hysterically, calling—to her or to Kylo?—“Oh, _very_ smooth! Bravo, well done!”

Rey got used to _them_ , too. When she offered to help them fix the ship as promised, they waved her off with complaints about how she’d only get in the way. But she saw how they glanced sidelong at her, how they didn’t actually shoo her away when she sat on a coil of rope and kept them company as they worked. She sensed that they at least appreciated the gesture, in their own way. 

“Were you mortal once too?” she asked. 

Kuruk made a disgusted noise. “Certainly not.” 

“We’ve always been storm spirits,” said Ap’lek. “We were here long before Snoke was.”

“He killed our last captain,” Ushar said grimly, “after he crawled out from whatever hole they threw him into.”

“Ren must have told you about the mutiny, yeah?” When Rey nodded, Cato continued, “He tell you why?” 

“Not in detail.”

“Snoke planned to use him as a vessel—take over Ren’s body, since his own was old and decrepit. He gave him power and a purpose, all right— _Snoke’s_ purpose.” Vicrul frowned. “Had he succeeded, there would’ve been nothing left of Ren.” 

Rey’s eyes widened in horror, her fingers going white-knuckled where they were clasped around her knees. 

“We found out. We warned him. We made a deal,” Trudgen continued. “If we helped Ren kill Snoke and get his soul back, he’d give us our ship back and go home.” 

Kuruk shrugged. “So far, we’re the only ones who’ve delivered.”

Rey bit her lip. _He’s trying_. “Can’t you just… leave?”

“Leave?” Ushar glared at her. “This is _our_ ship. Ren’s the intruder, and Snoke before him.”

“And even if we wanted to, we can’t. We’ve tried.” Trudgen scowled too, looking like it pained him to admit it. “It hurts like a bitch. _Literally_.”

“Does that happen to Kylo too?”

The Knights exchanged glances. “Ask him.”

##  **🌀**

When Rey dreamed again, she dreamed of Kylo. 

In her dream, he—a little younger, his face unscarred—rowed a longboat away from the _Silencer._

He didn’t get very far before the sea around him started to churn and boil. The corpses of drowned sailors, in various states of decomposition, burst from the water. They swarmed around his boat in such numbers that it listed dangerously from side to side as they clutched at the wood with grasping, bloated fingers. 

They spoke no words, but instead made a horrible, indistinct screaming that still sounded _furious_. 

Kylo’s eyes were wide and unseeing, and his chest heaved with gasping breaths as he tried to fight the corpses off. He brought the storm down upon them—blasting them with lightning that flashed blue-white in the darkness, buffeting them with gale-force winds, conjuring waves and waterspouts to fling them away. 

Still they swarmed, and clutched, and pulled. 

His boat tipped, and Kylo fell into the dark, churning sea. 

Rey heard herself screaming, felt herself trying to pull him out—but her hands passed through him like she was nothing but air. 

Kylo thrashed in the water, frantically trying to swim to the surface. The drowned ghouls descended on him like sharks on a kill, and he disappeared from sight— 

—and Rey bolted upright in her bed, panting, clutching the covers to her chest. _Just a dream_ , she told herself, drawing her knees up and burying her damp face in them. 

Still, some instinct she couldn’t define forced her out of bed, huddling into her coat and stumbling topside. Kylo stood at the gunwale once again, his profile thrown into sharp relief by the light of the waxing moon. The rush of relief was so strong that it took her breath away, and her sigh came out sounding more like a sob.

Kylo turned to her, and she saw the surprise—and something else, something like concern—on his face. “Rey? What is it?” 

“Bad dream,” she said shortly, trying not to let him hear the tears in her voice any more than necessary. She winced at the figure she must have made: clutching her coat around her, crying like a child over a nightmare. 

“Do… you want to talk about it?” he asked haltingly. At her wide-eyed stare, he shrugged—a small, self-deprecating motion. But he didn’t look away, even as his mouth quivered slightly. “I’ve heard it helps.” 

She folded her arms around herself, trying to slow her breathing, to compose herself before she answered. “No, thanks.”

He flinched a little. 

Rey took a hesitant step toward him, then another, until she stood beside him at the gunwale. She looked down at the moon reflected in the water, but his surprise hung nearly palpable between them, and she felt the weight of his gaze on her.

“Frankly,” she said, “I’d much rather talk about anything else.” Then, slowly and almost meditatively: “What’s the most amazing thing you’ve ever seen on the sea?” 

She sensed him stiffen even more at her side, and she sneaked a sidelong glance at him. “I know you’re cursed, but there must be something. I mean, the Leviathan was”—she shook her head, exhaling explosively—“terrifying, but… I’d never seen anything like it before.” 

After a moment, Kylo spoke.

Rey stared at the water and listened. Slowly, the terror of the nightmare began to fade, soothed by his low, rumbling baritone. 

##  **🌀**

She was… essentially asking him for a bedtime story. 

Fine. He supposed he could do that.

In her state, she probably wouldn’t appreciate hearing about the Kraken and its mythological brethren. So instead, he talked of coral reefs, their colors jewel-bright against the blue water— of giant underwater forests, kelp and seaweed waving gently in the currents. He talked of selkies, and sirens, and mermaids—all the creatures he’d believed, in his old life, to be nothing but stories told by sailors and nursemaids. 

As he spoke, he watched Rey slowly relax. Her white-knuckled grip on her coat loosened, and she leaned forward to rest her elbows on the gunwale instead of standing at it stiffly. She turned toward him by degrees, and he saw her brow smooth out and the shadows fade from her eyes. Eventually, she faced him completely, and he was treated to the sight of her leaning forward, lips slightly parted and hazel eyes bright with curiosity and awe—and something deeper, something soft and wondering that made his heart beat a quick, odd beat in his chest. 

_This_ , he realized, was actually the most amazing thing he’d ever seen on the sea: Rey looking at him without fear—and what was more, with warmth and fascination, as if _he_ were the amazing thing. He knew it must have been because of the stories he was telling her, but he’d take it anyway. 

“And Atlantis?” she asked suddenly. “Is that real too?”

After some thought, he said, slightly disgruntled by the admission, “I’m not sure. I’ve seen some undersea ruins, but I don’t actually know what they were before they sank.”

“Shame,” she quipped, a small smile playing around her mouth. “I’d have liked to tell—” She looked away, and just like that, the moment was gone. 

“What?” 

Her voice was soft and sad when she answered. “My crew. We used to tell each other those stories to amuse ourselves. I’d have liked to tell them they were true.” Suddenly, she froze, her eyes widening. 

“Rey?” 

She shook her head sharply. “Nothing. I— I think I can try to go back to sleep now.” She gave him a hasty nod, her eyes fixed somewhere in the vicinity of his neck, and turned to go. “Thank you, Kylo.”

Now the name felt _wrong_ , even—or perhaps especially—from her lips. What he’d done for her just now, the look on her face as she’d listened to him—that wasn’t for the Storm-bringer, the Death-dealer. 

“Ben,” he said. 

She looked back at him over her shoulder. “What?” 

“It’s my name. My birth name, not… not what Snoke renamed me after the contract.” He smiled, small and sad in the moonlight. “Just thought you should know.”

He’d never told anyone that before. He wasn’t even sure the Knights knew his old name.

The next day, however, it was as if all their previous rapport had been erased overnight. Rey spoke to him in clipped, curt tones—when she spoke to him at all—and would barely even look at him. 

The contrast made Ben’s chest ache. Was this what it was like to have one’s heart broken? Part of him wanted to throw himself at her feet, to ask her what he did wrong and beg her to let him make amends— 

—but no. He still had his pride, even if he had nothing else left. That pride would not bear laying his bruised heart at her feet again, only to watch her grind it further beneath her heel.

So he stayed away, shutting himself in his cabin and staring out the windows.

🌀

The Knights watched, bewildered and exasperated, as Rey and Ben danced around each other—or, rather, as Rey shut Ben out and he kept his distance.

“What the hell is going on?” Trudgen asked Ben. 

“What have you done to Ren?” Vicrul asked Rey. 

“He’s the most miserable we’ve ever seen him!” Ap’lek added. “He walks around like you drowned his pet spaniel or something!”

Neither of them answered. 

Nevertheless, Kuruk told Rey, “If you and Ren have a problem, either fight it out or fuck it out, for all our sakes. This is getting ridiculous.” 

She sputtered indignantly, the fire of her glare matched only by the equally brilliant blush on her face. 

But it wasn’t something so easily fixed. 

When Rey had remembered her crew that night on the deck, she’d also remembered that this couldn’t last. She might have been in the middle of a fairytale, a daydream, but sooner or later she had to either wake up—or die. Either way, she would lose people she cared about—

 _That_ was why she had frozen. 

She’d never meant to care about Ben—he’d surprised her. Maybe it was the scavenger in her, drawn to everything—and, apparently, everyone—that needed fixing. Or maybe it was the lost, lonely girl she told herself she no longer was, grasping for comfort wherever she could find it. Either way, she’d realized that she was getting too attached—that she needed to cut her losses _now_ , _quickly_ , before she got hurt when ( _when_ , she insisted fiercely, _not if_ ) they broke the curse and he walked out of her life forever. 

She could do it. 

She would be fine.

But it was only a few nights later that she woke from another nightmare, tears streaming down her face even before her eyes opened. She couldn’t breathe—the cabin was too small, too close around her. Blindly, unthinkingly, without even a coat, she scrambled topside.

Ben was in his usual position at the gunwale. Naturally, he turned to her—she had not been quiet or stealthy. “Good evening,” he said guardedly, tilting his head in half a nod before returning his gaze to the water. 

The lack of inflection in his voice, where once there had been something like fondness, hit harder than she expected. Rey opened her mouth to answer, and sobbed instead. 

Ben turned back to her, his face changed in an instant. He took a step toward her, hand half-raised—but seemed to think better of it at the last minute, and instead hovered awkwardly by the gunwale. “Rey?”

Rey clapped a hand over her mouth, trying to compose herself before answering. “Another nightmare,” she answered, her voice still thick with tears. 

She went over to where he stood, and, not looking at him, began to speak. 

She told him how she’d been in some dark, formless void, infinite versions of herself behind and before her, the procession stretching on and on till it was out of her sight. She’d known there was somewhere she had to go, and she’d walked and walked until she saw two shadowy figures some distance ahead of her. 

Their backs had been turned, but they felt _familiar_ , somehow, and Rey had known, in the instinctive way of dreams, that she needed to reach them. “My parents—at least, I think they were,” she said, shrugging, dashing the back of her hand across her eyes. 

She’d walked and walked, but never seemed to get any closer to them.

She’d run, but still they remained out of reach.

She’d cried, “Wait! Come back!” and the sound had echoed until the void fairly reverberated with her voice, but the shadowy pair never turned around.

“I’d never felt so alone,” she finished. 

“You’re not alone.” Ben’s voice was soft and deep, as sure as if he were stating some immutable law of nature. 

Slowly, Rey looked up at him. “Neither are you,” she whispered. 

This was what it meant to stare into someone’s soul, she realized. For the first time, it wasn’t a terrifying thought. There was _something_ in his eyes—something so deep and so tender that it made her think she could fall into him and he would catch her. 

They could have stood there for a moment, or an hour, or the whole night— 

—and then Ben asked, “Have you ever tried to find your parents?”

“I went back to our old house. But it was empty.” Rey bit her lip. “All anyone could tell me was that they’d gone a long way away, a long time ago. Ever since then I’ve… always kept an eye out on the horizon. Hoped I’d see them on a ship one day.” 

When he replied, it was with the careful air of a man balancing on a tightrope. “But if you haven’t seen them again—” 

“Don’t say it.”

“Rey—” 

“They can’t be—” she gasped. “ _I_ _can’t—_ ” 

She burst into tears again. Her sobs were deep, guttural things rattling in her chest, and her knees buckled from the force of her weeping.

Large, strong hands on her arms steadied her, and she threw herself forward blindly. 

Ben was warm and solid against her, and she clung to him, her fingers curling desperately into his shirt. He froze for a split second—and then wrapped his arms around her. “I’m here,” he murmured in her ear, over and over, a steady refrain as he cradled her head and rubbed slow, soothing circles over her back.

In the turbulence of her emotions, Rey thought that it sounded like a vow, rather than an empty platitude. 

Eventually, her sobs quieted into something more manageable, and then tapered off entirely. Her first instinct was to pull away—but _gods_ , she was exhausted, and how bad could it be to lean on him, just this once? 

“Come on, back to bed,” he murmured. 

She nodded limply against his chest. 

Ben escorted her back to her cabin, walking beside her with a hand resting lightly at the small of her back. When they reached her door, he paused. She waited, but all he said was a quiet, “Good night, Rey.” 

As he turned to go, she grabbed at his sleeve. “Wait.” 

Ben froze, staring at her hand, then her face, in shock. 

Rey quickly let go, but still looked up at him. “I— I don’t want to be alone. Not tonight. Please?”

His jaw clenched against some emotion she couldn’t name, and he nodded hesitantly. Rey opened her door wider to let him in, and as he closed it behind him, she lay down on her side. After a moment, the mattress dipped and creaked as he got in beside her. 

She knew, intellectually, that she wasn’t alone, but it wasn’t enough. She scooted backward until they were flush together—and this close, she could _feel_ his chest expand against her back as he drew a soft, sharp breath. 

There was something still missing. 

She wrestled with herself for a moment. Finally, she closed her eyes and asked—not quite whispering, yet somehow even more tremulous and tentative, “Hold me?”

He only hesitated a moment before carefully laying an arm over her waist and drawing her even closer against him. His breath rustled the fine hairs at her nape, and Rey shivered lightly. He must have noticed—but he said nothing, for which she was grateful. 

“Thank you, Ben,” she whispered, as the warmth of him seeped into her weary body and tugged her ever closer to sleep. 

His arm briefly tightened and relaxed around her, and she felt—or thought she felt—him press a gentle kiss into her hair.

When Rey opened her eyes again, the sky was grayish-blue outside the windows. She jolted a little at the warm weight of Ben’s arm still around her waist, at the rhythmic rise and fall of his chest against her back. 

He was all around her, and she expected to feel trapped or panicked. 

She didn’t. 

Behind her, Ben stirred. “Rey?” he mumbled, his voice thick with sleep. 

“I'm all right,” she breathed, laying a hand over his where it rested on her belly. 

He hummed drowsily, and now she was _sure_ she felt full, soft lips press against her shoulder through the linen of her nightshirt.

It was surreal—and soothing. 

If this, too, was a dream, Rey didn’t want to wake up quite yet. She wanted to lie in Ben’s arms and watch the sun rise over the water.

Early morning sunlight shone through the window, falling golden over the two figures sleeping, tangled together, in the bed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ~~Ask me about the literary references in this chapter? 👀 Or try to guess them? 👀~~
> 
> If you liked this, please don't forget to leave a comment or kudos, or come say hi on [twitter](https://twitter.com/niennathegrey) or [tumblr](niennathegrey.tumblr.com). Thanks for reading!


	7. Chapter 7

Rey had been on the _Silencer_ for a little over a month. 

By now, apparently even she was at her wits’ end with the books. She suggested taking the curse at its most literal, and looking for some physical object that Snoke might have hidden it in, like in the tale of the sorcerer from Takobo. 

Ben had already done this same thing himself multiple times over the years, but he didn’t have it in him to deny Rey’s seemingly boundless hope. 

They passed into stranger seas the further they sailed, and Rey saw the proof of Ben’s tales firsthand. One day it was a seal swimming beside the _Silencer_ , looking up at the ship with intelligent eyes— _green_ eyes, not the button-black of an ordinary seal’s. Another day it was little wavelets around the prow—like those made by dolphins, save for the iridescent flashes beneath the water.

One afternoon, as she and Ben ended their usual spar and the sun sank slowly below the horizon, there was a low, melodic hum in the air. Rey cocked her head, intrigued. “Do you hear that?”

“Yeah.” Ben gazed moodily out across the water. “Wait a while. You’ll have another tale for your crew shortly.” 

Later, as the first stars appeared, it began: a chorus of female voices, rising and falling together in song. _“_ Oh,” she breathed, rushing to the gunwale and nearly falling over it in her excitement. “Ben, _look_.” 

Ben had seen them before, but he came to stand beside her anyway. There they were, just barely visible by the light of the stars: a procession of mermaids, rising half-out of the water, necks arched and heads thrown back as they sang to the stars. 

Objectively, it was one of the most magnificent things he had ever heard in either his mortal or immortal life. The mermaids’ wordless song was haunting in its beauty, the melody as majestic and ancient and primal as the world itself— 

—but it paled in comparison to Rey’s face just then. She was enraptured, her eyes closed and a soft smile on her lips as she listened. Even after the song had faded away and the mermaids slipped back beneath the waves, it was some time before she opened her eyes again and turned to him with a contented little sigh. “That was _beautiful_.” 

“Yes, it is,” he echoed, eyes still fixed on her. 

Rey’s brow furrowed at the pensiveness in his voice. “What’s wrong?” 

Ben hesitated, then said, “It made me think of my grandfather. Anakin Skywalker.” He lingered contemplatively over each syllable. “I never met him, but I heard… stories.”

“Not the good kind, then?” 

“Depends on your point of view, I suppose. They say he was a great sailor, that he always made it safe through every storm, every pirate attack. People used to say he had the devil’s own luck. ‘Nope, just a friendly mermaid watching my back,’ he always said. He insisted he’d made friends with one, called her Ahsoka. Naturally”—he tried to smirk, but it rang hollow—“they thought he was sea-touched. Especially after he insisted his wife would die in childbirth, and sailed off to look for a way to stop it. She was so broken-hearted that she died anyway.”

Rey gasped quietly, her eyes filled with compassion for the long-dead couple. 

As if a dam had broken somewhere inside him, Ben continued his quiet unraveling of the past. “My parents thought I was headed the same way. I wasn’t…” He swallowed, forcing the words out past the sudden lump—his heart, perhaps—in his throat. “I wasn’t the strapping, manly son my father wanted. I was… a quiet child. Read a lot, liked books more than people. They didn’t know what to do with me, so they packed me off onto my uncle’s ship. Thought maybe he was better suited to help.” He shrugged, the attempt at nonchalance at odds with the gravity of his words. “You know the rest.”

Snoke had seen it all when he’d abducted him. For as long as he lived, Ben would never forget the sensation—cold, dry, _dead_ —of Snoke slithering into all the secret places of his mind, slipping past his defenses with contemptuous ease. “What a fascinating creature you are,” the Old God had crooned with unholy delight. “So much hope. So much pain. So much _potential_. But your family does not see that, do they? No, they only see how far you could fall—nothing of the heights to which you could rise.” 

Then he had stretched out a withered, clawlike hand. “I can change that. Never again will you lurk in your family’s shadow, hungry for any scrap of affection they deign to bestow.” 

And that was the rub, wasn’t it? For while he had accepted the contract to save himself, Ben could not deny that some dark, angry part of him had reared its head, then. He had thrilled at the thought of commanding the wind and waves, at the image of his regal mother and his cocksure father staring at him in awe as he gazed down at them from the prow of the _Silencer._

He had grasped at a chance to finally be _someone_ —something more than a callow, soft-hearted stripling, forever running after ever-distant parents.

Then he had felt a great _rushing_ somewhere within him, and an icy sense of loss—

—and the next thing he knew, he had collapsed onto the deck, his limbs shuddering with unearthly cold. 

Above him, Snoke had nodded with a satisfied smile. Some sort of translucent, ice-white vapor floated around his emaciated fingers, and as Ben watched, it coalesced into a vial of frosted glass, glowing with an unearthly light. “From this moment on, you are Kylo Ren. Arise, and take your place among my servants.” 

Oh, what a damned blind _fool_ he had been— 

A touch on his arm—light and tentative as butterfly wings, yet more than enough to make his skin tingle beneath his sleeve—recalled him to the present. With a deep, shuddering exhale, he looked up. Rey’s eyes, impossibly soft in the starlight, met his. “I know how that feels.” 

He cocked his head inquisitively. It wasn’t that he didn’t believe her, it was just— as radiant and full of life as she was, he couldn’t imagine how anyone could know her and not adore her. 

“No, truly. You know how I saw you destroy the _Niima_? Ever since then I—” She shook her head and looked away, cheeks tinged faintly pink. She wrapped her arms around herself, and Ben found himself instantly missing the slight weight of her hand. “Oh, you’ll laugh at me.”

“I won’t,” he said gently. 

Even so, she didn’t look him in the eye when she continued, instead staring down at the sliver of space on the deck between them. “I kept an eye out for the _Silencer_.” She laughed self-deprecatingly. “Isn’t that silly? I didn’t even really know what I would do if I ever saw you again.” 

He hadn’t been expecting _that_ —or the small curl of warmth in his chest at her words. “You looked… for _me_?” 

“I think I wanted to prove I hadn’t been seeing things.” She smiled ruefully. “My crew thought I was chasing fairytales too. They thought… a lot of things about me, actually. Weren’t always subtle about it either.” 

Her voice was deceptively light, and Ben felt a flash of irrational anger on her behalf. “What things?” 

Rey shook her head dismissively. “Nothing important. None of it was true, anyway. As if Leia and Han went in for preferential treatment—”

He froze. “What?”

She apparently mistook his shock for ignorance. “Queen Leia and— well, technically he’s King Consort, but he hates being called that—” She smiled fondly, her nose wrinkling with it. “Han Solo of Alderaan. I washed up on the beach below the castle after the wreck of the _Niima._ They took me in.” 

And _oh,_ what were the odds? He swallowed against the sharp, swift ache in his chest. “My parents.” 

She stared at him, wide-eyed. “Ben…?” He saw the wheels turning in her mind as her eyes roamed over his face, and he distantly wondered what they had said about him, that she should look at him so intently. “You’re _Ben Solo._ You’re the lost prince.” 

He laughed—a short, humorless sound. “Fortunately, they had you to take my place.” 

She flinched. “That’s not true.”

“I hope they at least treated you better than they did me.” They must have. He could see it in his mind, clear as day: his father bonding with her over the intricacies of sailing, his mother guiding her like the daughter she’d never had, Rey basking in their attention with a joyful smile. 

Rey shook her head, her eyes imploring. Her words tumbled out in a rush, nearly running into each other in her effort to make him understand. “Ben, they love you and miss you. You know Leia still believes you aren’t dead? She lights a candle in the window of her bedchamber for you every night. To light your way home, she says. And she hasn’t chosen a new heir. Everyone thinks she’s gone mad with grief for you and Luke, but she doesn’t care!”

He could only stare at her, as helpless as a moth to a flame, as she finished earnestly, “She’ll be so glad to see you again. Her and Han both.” 

Gods damn him, but he _wanted_ to believe her—so much so that it was almost a physical pain, that tears welled in his eyes. She talked like it was the simplest thing in the world. But there wasn’t much time left to break the curse—and even if they did, he had caused so much death that his hands would never be clean. “Their son is gone, Rey. One way or another.” 

“No,” she said, quietly but firmly. _Still that boundless hope._ “You’re more than what Snoke made you, Ben. Even now. Can’t you see it?” 

Slowly, never taking her eyes from his, Rey reached up, her hand trembling ever so slightly. Ben shivered at the first touch of her fingers to his face, and he couldn’t help the soft, shaky breath that escaped him when she cupped his cheek.

There was something gentle and wondering in her eyes, and he wanted to fall into her, to bask in her light. “You’ll be home soon,” she murmured, her thumb stroking back and forth along his scar. “I’ll help you.” 

_You’re my home._ He knew it was true the moment the words formed in his mind. He’d been trapped on the _Silencer_ for years, had wanted nothing more than to leave—but, _gods_ , it felt _right_ , being with Rey. She had made life on the ship almost bearable. 

His thoughts must have been written all over his face, because she said, still in the same quiet tone, “Stay with me?” 

“Why?” he whispered, lost. _I don’t deserve it, don’t deserve_ you _—_

“Because I want you to.” 

That night, Rey curled into his chest, tucking her head underneath his chin. “Sleep, Ben,” she whispered, her breath ghosting across his collarbone.

There were so many things he wanted to say, but he swallowed them all down and instead moved to hold her, hoping she could hear them all in the strength of his grip on her waist, in the soft, lingering kiss he pressed to her hair.

##  **🌀**

Rey woke to a half-formed plan—and also to the sight of Ben beneath her. 

He’d rolled onto his back in the night, pulling her along until she sprawled half atop him, his arm heavy across the small of her back. 

She needed to leave without waking him—with what he’d told her about mermaids last night, he probably wouldn’t want to be around them. _Besides, he needs the rest._

She had to go. But still she stayed, looking down at Ben—making sure he was truly asleep, she told herself. His full lips were parted slightly, and the tip of an ear peeked out from the dark, wavy mess of his hair. He looked so much younger and softer in repose that a swell of affection rose in Rey’s chest, and it seemed like the most natural thing in the world to brush a stray lock of hair from his face. 

He leaned into her touch with a low hum, lashes fluttering gently against his cheeks. Rey froze—but Ben didn’t wake, instead burrowing further into the pillow. 

She wriggled carefully out from under his arm and got dressed, glancing back at him one more time before quietly shutting the door behind her. 

“Can you summon a mermaid?” she asked the Knights as she appeared topside. 

Cato hummed noncommittally. “It's _possible_ , yeah.”

Vicrul raised an eyebrow. “Why, may one ask?”

“Mermaids are supposed to be”—Rey waved a hand vaguely—“wise and mystical, aren’t they? They might know where to look for Ben’s soul.”

Ap’lek grinned impishly. “Oh, it’s _Ben_ now, is it?

Rey rounded on her, lifting her chin stubbornly. “It’s his name, isn’t it?” When the redhead lifted her hands placatingly, still smirking, Rey growled, “Will you help me or not?” 

“Sure,” Ushar said suddenly, and Rey looked at her in shock—the lightning spirit had always been the least civil towards her out of all the Knights. 

Ushar rose from where she’d been lounging on a coil of rope and strode past Rey with a challenging smirk and a come-hither jerk of the head. 

Somewhat warily, Rey followed her to the gunwale. “All right. What do I do?”

Ushar gestured grandly to the water, a cruel smile on her face. “Well, over you go, sunshine.” 

Rey balked. “ _What?”_

“The quickest way to summon a mermaid is to drop somebody into the sea. Then they either save or drown them, depending on how they’re feeling that day.” Ushar stepped forward intently. 

Rey tensed, hand flying to her glaive.

To her surprise, it was Trudgen who stopped the incipient fight, shaking his head at both women. “No, no, no, not _her._ ” Then he looked at Rey, and she saw that he was desperately trying not to burst out laughing. “You know, you’d have much better luck if we chucked _Ren_ in instead.” 

“What?”

“Oh, that’d work!” Ap’lek crowed, not even trying to be serious. “Trust me, you’d be beating them off with a stick if you did.”

A fierce protectiveness surged up in Rey, then. The thought of the mermaids—those beautiful, otherworldly creatures—surrounding Ben and running their hands over him shaded too close to the memory of her nightmare for her liking. _No! Mine!_ “Ben doesn’t need to know about this.”

When the Knights continued to smirk and snicker—seemingly uncaring about Ben’s fate, about her fate, that she was doing her best to _help_ —Rey unslung her glaive from her shoulder with a growl and leveled it at them. “What the _hell_ is wrong with you lot?” she snarled. “I’m trying to save us all! I don’t expect you to be grateful, but you could at least give a damn!”

The Knights regarded her silently, with surprise and grudging respect. 

“Feisty little hellion, aren’t you?” Vicrul finally said, inclining his head. “I suppose you truly are a match for Ren.” Half turning over his shoulder, he ordered, “Cato. Do as she asks.”

Cato patted himself down, as if looking for something. He seemed disgruntled at not finding anything other than the finely wrought dagger at his hip. “Aw, come on—” 

“Just do it,” Vicrul said flatly. “I’ll owe you a new one next wreck.”

“Yeah, you will.” Cato faced the gunwale and intoned, “O daughters of the waves, take thou my offering and heed my call.” Then he threw the dagger as far out into the ocean as he could. It flashed in the sun as it arced through the air and dropped into the water with a faint splash.

Rey watched with bated breath. 

Before long, the dagger rose back out of the water beside the ship. First the blade appeared— then the hilt, clutched in a tanned—no, an _orange_ hand— then an arm, and a shoulder, and finally, a regal, otherworldly face. The woman’s skin was orange, her cheeks and brow framed by intricate white markings. Her hair was white too, hanging in twin braids threaded through with deep blue seaweed. Her eyes were blue and keen. 

Rey gasped. 

The mermaid studied her with dignified surprise. “So it _is_ true. The Storm-bringer has taken a mate.” She nodded. “Greetings, Storm-queen.” 

Rey’s jaw dropped, and a blush crept up the back of her neck. “Sorry?”

“I came across the Leviathan after you’d finished with it,” the mermaid explained. “Told me all about this wonderful girl who pulled a Kraken tooth from its side after she got everyone else”—she frowned at the Knights—“to stop attacking it.” 

“It was a big fucking sea serpent ramming the ship, what were we _supposed_ to think?” Ap’lek grumbled. 

“Oh.” Rey blinked. “I’m… glad it’s all right now.”

“It also said the Storm-bringer was helping you, _listening_ to you,” the mermaid continued with a wry quirked eyebrow. 

“Well, yes, he helped. But I— I’m _not_ his mate, it’s not like that—” Rey paused. What _was_ it like, then?

She wasn’t his prisoner, and never really had been. Were they friends? Yes, she supposed so—they had common interests and were comfortable (more or less) around each other. But then, Rose and Finn were her friends too, but the air was never as… _charged_ between them as it was with her and Ben, like they were always on the edge of some precipice she couldn’t even define—

Kuruk cleared his throat loudly. 

Rey shook her head. _Right, yes, deal with that later._ Rather awkwardly, she said, “My name is Rey. May I know yours?” 

The mermaid’s tail flicked warily. “You may call me Ahsoka.” 

Rey’s eyes widened. Leaning over the gunwale, she called eagerly, “Did you ever know a sailor named Anakin Skywalker?” 

Ahsoka looked surprised, then smiled fondly. “Ah, Skyguy. Yes, I accompanied him on many of his voyages. Why?” 

“His grandson is captain of the _Silencer_ now.”

“But how?”

“Snoke kidnapped him and took his soul, then cursed him and everyone on the ship when he tried to free himself.” 

“It was big news when Snoke was killed, but I had no idea _who_ did it.” Ahsoka looked grave. “That _is_ a bad business. Poor boy.” 

“Can you help us? We…” Rey glanced over her shoulder at the hatch leading below deck. “ _He_ just wants to go home.”

“What do you need?”

“His soul. It’s the only term of the curse left to fulfill. Do you think Snoke might have hidden it in a box or jar or _something_ , anywhere under the sea?”

“Soul magic is tricky even at the best of times, and Snoke was a cunning old bastard,” Ahsoka said thoughtfully. “If he _did_ hide it somewhere, it’s not likely to be anywhere you could reach from your ship.”

Rey sighed and hung her head. “Ben said that too. I just— I had to _try._ ”

Now Ahsoka looked at her with sympathy. “On the other hand, hiding it in a physical object is the general method of soul magic. So there’s also the possibility that Snoke _didn’t_ do that, because it would be too easy.” 

“What do you mean?”

“I suggest looking where you least expect.”

Rey blinked, mulling this over until her face scrunched with annoyance. “Do you have any less cryptic advice?” Her eyes widened in shock at her own irreverence, and she half-expected Ahsoka to disappear beneath the water, irredeemably offended. 

Instead, to her surprise, the mermaid chuckled warmly. “You have a stout heart, little Storm-queen. It will serve you well.” 

“Well enough to get us home?” Rey muttered. 

“‘Us?’” Ahsoka tilted her head. “I can see why _he’d_ want to leave. But what about you?”

Rey blinked in surprise—she’d have thought that was obvious. “Well, I want to go home too. The only way I can do that is to break the curse.” 

Ahsoka nodded sagely. “So you want to take him home?”

“I— yes?” Rey was distantly aware of the Knights sniggering behind her again. 

Ahsoka arched a thin eyebrow. “Well then. You have everything you need. Or”—she tilted her head appraisingly—“you _would_ , but there’s something holding you back.”

“Perhaps the lack of any clear directions?”

Ahsoka snorted. “We may be wise, but we’re not mind-readers. It is your burden to bear—I can only give you hints, not _tell_ you what it is.”

“What— this is about _Ben_ , why are we talking about me—”

“His fate will be the same as yours.” The mermaid nodded. “I wish you both good fortune.” 

Rey flung a hand out. “Wait—”

“Farewell, Storm-queen.” _Now_ Ahsoka dove back underwater, flicking her tail as she left.

Rey stared open-mouthed at the spot where she had been. “I— that— that was _not helpful._ ”

Trudgen clapped a heavy hand on her shoulder. “Well,” he said, amused but not unsympathetic, “I guess wise and mystical doesn't mean easy answers, eh, sunshine?”

Rey shook her head, barely paying attention. “I’m just a girl with a stick,” she had told Ben when they first formed their truce. Now, more than ever, she began to fear that it _was_ true, that she _couldn’t_ actually break the curse, that both she and Ben would be trapped forever. 

##  **🌀**

The fear hung over her all day, turning her quiet and pensive. She saw Ben glancing at her when he thought she couldn’t see, and gave him a weak smile in return. 

Rey knew he wasn’t fooled, but she didn’t want to worry him even more. _She_ had asked Ahsoka for help. _She_ would figure the cryptic mumbo-jumbo out herself.

That was why she stayed topside even after the sun had set, standing at the gunwale and staring at the stars reflected in the water.

Footsteps sounded behind her. Rey glanced over her shoulder, tilting her head in wordless invitation. “Hi.”

“Hello.” Ben joined her at the gunwale. After a beat of silence, he asked, “Another nightmare?”

Even through her gloom, she heard the concern in his voice, and it touched her. “Just thinking. I haven’t even gone to bed, actually.”

He gulped quietly. “Anything I can help with?”

Rey fidgeted almost guiltily for a moment, then blurted out, “I talked to the mermaids this morning.” 

“Oh.” He sounded oddly relieved, and she wondered why. “Wait, how?”

“The Knights summoned one and I asked the questions.” 

“They _listened_ to you?” Now he sounded impressed.

“Yes. Well.” She smiled, half abashed and half proud. “Only after I waved my staff and yelled at them.”

A beat of silence—and Ben laughed.

It wasn’t his usual huffed, breathy chuckle, but a full, resonant laugh. It was so unexpected that Rey’s head snapped around in his direction—

—and now _she_ was the one staring at _him_ , because she’d never seen his face this open before. His eyes crinkled at the corners with his mirth, and his lips were parted enough to expose his adorably crooked teeth. Rey’s heart hammered in her chest, and her fingers twitched with the urge to trace the dimples curving around his mouth. 

Meanwhile, Ben shook his head. “I can barely get them to listen to _me_ , but you— gods, Rey, you’re”—there was awe in his smile now, and an infinite tenderness—“amazing.”

No one had ever looked at her like that before, and Rey swayed infinitesimally closer. 

Then his words sunk in, and she remembered why she was up here in the first place. “I’m really not,” she said, turning away and looking back at the water as her brow wrinkled with frustration. “I still don't know any more than you do about where to look.” 

“That's not your fault.” 

She fiddled with the hem of her tunic as she turned back to face him. “I met Ahsoka.” 

Ben’s eyes widened. 

“I thought she'd help us for your grandfather's sake, but her advice was too cryptic to be of much use.” She shrugged. “Could have been worse, I suppose. She could have not spoken to me at all.” 

“You tamed a shipful of storm gods. I don't think anyone could deny you when you set your heart on something.” 

A lone mermaid’s voice floated through the air. Tonight it was a slow, wistful tune, like a love song without words. Rey perked up, swaying gently along with the music, only half-aware that she did so. “Gods, I could listen to them forever,” she breathed. “Nothing like the music back at the palace.”

Ben hummed in agreement. “True. I hated the endless galas and balls.”

“Yeah, me too. I mean,” she clarified hastily, “I don't hate _dancing_ , exactly. It just… never felt right, there.”

“Like you never belonged.” His voice was heavy with meaning. 

She looked up at him, unsure whether to be offended. Then she saw the pointed look in his eyes and understood. “Yes,” she said, barely above a whisper. 

“So you've never danced before?” he asked, equally quietly. 

“No.” 

He held out a hand. “May I?”

Rey laughed—a small, breathless sound. “Now? Here?” 

“Why not?” Ben tried for a cocky smile, the expression belied by his wide eyes and the infinitesimal tremble in his outstretched hand. “No one but ourselves to judge, should we step on each other.”

She winced briefly at the thought, but took his hand anyway. 

They moved to the middle of the deck as the mermaid continued to sing. Rey forced herself to remember the dancing lessons Leia had insisted on and placed her left hand on Ben’s shoulder as he clasped her right hand. Meanwhile, his right hand hovered by her waist before he touched it, as softly as if she were made of glass. 

It was all very proper and decorous—yet even these slight touches felt like lit brands, burning through the layers of clothes between them.

Their eyes met. 

“Don’t step on me,” she joked weakly. 

“Never,” he breathed.

And then they were off, dancing serviceably—if not exactly _beautifully_ —across the deck. They’d sparred often enough by now that Rey knew exactly how quick on his feet Ben was—she just… hadn’t expected that skill to extend outside of combat. “You’re pretty good at this.”

“Don't tell Master Threepio,” he said dryly, and she laughed. “They made me learn, of course, but I never liked it. Not till now.” His gaze on her was less a weight and more a _caress_ , now.

Rey’s breath caught in her throat. 

The air between them was charged, like the pause just before the gray thunderheads released the first drops of rain. 

Slowly, almost unwillingly, they coasted to a stop in the middle of the deck as the mermaid’s song ended. Still they held each other, unable to look away. 

“I've never _wanted_ to dance with anyone before now,” Ben said softly. “You make me want… _so_ many things, Rey.” 

His eyes were dark and soft and so _yearning_ , and his lips were parted and trembling slightly. He was moving closer, and so was she— but he was moving _too_ slowly, and she wanted him _now_ and didn’t know what else to do— 

—so she surged upward and kissed him. 

Rey had never kissed anyone before, and it was dizzying how the rest of the world narrowed down to Ben: how warm and soft his lips were, and the almost shy way they moved against hers— his hand sliding up her arm, leaving goosebumps in its wake, to cradle the back of her neck— his fingers weaving through her hair and his thumb caressing the base of her skull— the hard muscle of his shoulders beneath her palms. 

He held her like she was something rare and wonderful and precious, and every gentle touch sent shivers down her spine and heat pooling low in her belly. She hummed with pleasure, and now it was Ben shivering against her, pulling her closer. 

They could have stood there for a moment or an eternity, but either way they eventually had to part for breath. Ben chased Rey’s mouth with his own for a heartbeat, and then they both opened their eyes. 

_Was that all right?_ Rey wondered as she gazed up at him. His eyes were slightly hazy, as if he were in a waking dream. “Ben…”

“Don’t be afraid,” he murmured, leaning down to rest his forehead against hers. “I feel it too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Taking a break for the holidays after this one, but at least we've left you on a high note! 
> 
> If you liked this, please don't forget to leave a comment or kudos, or come say hi on [twitter](https://twitter.com/niennathegrey) or [tumblr](niennathegrey.tumblr.com). Thanks for reading!


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A bit of housekeeping: 
> 
> 1) cw: canon-typical child abandonment (Rey), shown via flashback; I've added it to the tags.
> 
> 2) I'm really enjoying the speculation in the comments about the nature of the curse! I put in _a lot of work_ to set it up, and it's been so flattering to see that it's intrigued some of you enough to send in your theories. Thank you so much 😊
> 
> 3) here we FINALLY earn that E rating ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) Please note that this chapter is also plot-important, so if you'd like to skip the smut scenes, the first one starts at the beginning of the chapter and ends at the 🌀 symbol, while the second one starts from "There was an edge of desperation in the way he touched her..." and also ends at the 🌀 symbol. 
> 
> Thanks for your patience, folks, and I hope that wherever you are, you're staying safe. 
> 
> And now, back to our story!

Kissing Ben proved to be addictive. 

It was mystifying, how such a seemingly simple action could feel so good, could make her press ever closer to him in search of something she couldn’t even name. 

They were kissing in the library one evening, Rey nearly in Ben’s lap as they curled together on the rug. He pressed forward a little too eagerly, and the world tilted until her back hit the floor. 

Ben muttered something against her lips that might have been “Sorry,” but Rey shook her head and tugged him down to lie flush atop her, instinctively parting her legs to make room for him. He fit there like he was made for her, and when his hips jerked against hers—once, shallowly, like he couldn’t help it—Rey _moaned_ into his mouth. She rolled her hips upward, chasing the friction, and before long, they were rutting against each other through their clothes, the kiss turning sloppier and more frantic as they moaned and panted. 

Rey was lost, every inch of her body drawn tight as a bowstring. A particularly hard thrust from Ben had her throwing her head back with a sharp cry. The friction was _delicious_ , but somehow it wasn’t enough, she wanted, _needed_ —

Alarmed, he stilled against her, and Rey’s eyes flew open at the sudden absence of pleasure. “Do you want to stop?” he panted, his arms trembling with the effort of bracing himself above her. 

“No!” It was almost a whimper, but she couldn’t bring herself to care. “I want—” She fumbled for words, her head thrashing from side to side in frustration. “— _more_.”

Ben looked down at her, a silent, weighty question in his eyes. 

Rey bit her lip. _Please_. 

Whatever he saw seemed to have moved him—his throat worked soundlessly, and he gazed at her with such aching tenderness that her breath caught in her throat. Then he lifted her from the floor, carrying her— _like a bride_ , Rey thought, her stomach fluttering—into the small, spartan sleeping quarters adjoining the library. 

He laid her on his bed, hovering above her on his elbows. But even that miniscule distance felt like too much, and she promptly started clawing at his shirt, fumbling with the laces of his pants. He dipped his head and brushed his lips over her questing fingers, the sweetness of the gesture at odds with the speed with which he undressed himself.

When Ben was, at last, fully nude above her, Rey glanced down between their bodies. She could _feel_ the hot, hard planes of him all along the length of her, but wanted to _see_ him too. She pushed clumsily at his shoulder at the same moment that he ran a tentative finger along the hem of her tunic. He froze instantly, and something hurt and vulnerable flashed through his eyes before he began to climb off her. 

“No,” she gasped, grabbing at his shoulders, his arms with shaking fingers. When he moved back towards her—slowly as a spooked animal, which made Rey’s heart ache—she flipped them over. He made a quiet, surprised grunt as his back hit the mattress, then stared up at her with wide eyes as she perched atop his thighs. “There,” she breathed, sitting back and looking her fill. 

_Gods,_ she’d never known that men could be this beautiful. Ben was broad everywhere, shoulders, arms, and chest all thick with muscle. Rey smoothed her hands all up and down the lines of his body, half-convinced she was in a dream after all— and _oh_ , it was intoxicating to feel those defined muscles flex at her touch, to feel his body—and hers—vibrate with his groans. 

And further down—

Ben’s cock was as large and thick as the rest of him, jutting out proudly from a thatch of coarse, dark curls. Rey bit her lip, half nervous and half curious at the prospect of fitting it inside her. 

She’d never done this before, but neither was she completely innocent. She’d seen enough couplings between the _Niima_ ’s sailors and the women in the ports to both know how sex worked and deem it a painful, messy ordeal. 

But everything they’d done so far had felt— _good_. Surely it could only be building to something better? 

Well, she wasn’t going to find out by just _staring_ at his cock—which twitched underneath her gaze, and as if in answer, she felt a deep, insistent throb between her own legs. Rey tugged her clothes off and tossed them on the floor with little ceremony. 

If Ben had been surprised before, now he stiffened underneath her with a sharp inhale, gazing up at her with his pupils blown wide and his jaw slack. 

“What?” Rey fought the urge to fidget self-consciously. She knew she wasn’t pretty in the way men apparently preferred, all sinew and lean muscle where most women had full curves and soft, pillowy flesh— 

—but Ben shook his head. “You’re beautiful,” he answered, sounding almost dazed by the knowledge. He rested a tentative hand on her hip, his thumb tracing gentle circles against the jut of bone. 

And how was it that _this_ was what made her feel truly laid bare, even more than taking her clothes off had? Rey closed her suddenly-prickling eyes as she crawled up to kiss him again. 

Then she shuffled back, hovering just above his cock. With an air of great concentration, she took it in hand—and promptly looked up, eyes wide, as Ben made an odd, choked-off noise. “What— what happened, did I hurt you—” 

“No,” he panted as his cock twitched within her still-closed hand, “it— it’s good. You”—and now he moaned sharply as her fingers clenched in surprise—“f-feel— so _good_.” 

He wasn’t even inside her, and he was already half undone, Rey realized, with a wild, wanton sort of thrill. She lowered herself onto him slowly—as much to adjust to the unfamiliar fullness as to watch Ben’s head loll back and his eyelashes flutter with every inch of him she took. 

When she was fully seated on him, Rey blew a long breath out through pursed lips. It didn’t _hurt,_ exactly, but she did feel— _stretched,_ in a way she’d never been before. She glanced up at Ben and found his face drawn into a tight grimace, his chest heaving as he took deep, gulping breaths.

Rey’s brow furrowed. For all the fuss men made about sex, it certainly didn’t look like he was enjoying himself. “Are you sure you’re all right?”

“Yeah, just—” Ben opened his eyes, and the molten _desire_ in them made her insides flutter. “Give me a minute?”

His body, however, seemed to have other ideas. His hips bucked up once, almost reflexively, and Rey couldn’t hide a wince as he slipped even deeper inside her.

“ _Fuck_ —” Ben gasped, horrified. “Sorry— I'm sorry, Rey, I-I didn't—” His hands landed on her waist, then ran up and down her sides, keeping pace with his strained, panicked apologies. 

Rey shook her head and grabbed at his hands, stilling their frantic path. “Just—”

 _Come here_ — _hold me_ —

—and how was it that her lips refused to shape the words, that she shied away from such an innocent request when he was already _inside_ her? She bit her lip and tugged mutely at his hands instead, hoping he would understand. 

Ben looked at her, his eyes dark and soft, then slowly sat up beneath her until they were chest-to-chest. Equally slowly, he wrapped an arm around her waist and the other around her shoulders—not crushing her to him, just… holding her. 

The change in angle was— strange, at first, and Rey closed her eyes and furrowed her brow as she readjusted. 

Ben moaned quietly, his heart beating swift and strong against her. Yet still he did not thrust up into her, or even touch her, except to trace aimless, soothing strokes over her back.

His gentleness roused something in her, and with equal sweetness, Rey kissed him once more.

Without breaking the kiss, she raised up on her knees slightly and began to move— and _now_ they broke away, gasping in unison at the pleasure that shot through them.

Soon they fell into a rhythm, Rey’s fingers digging into Ben’s shoulders as she moved against him. He thrust up into her slowly, gently, dotting kisses along her neck and shoulders. It felt good— _he_ felt good—but it was a slow, tentative kind of pleasure, and some instinct told her there was _more_.

“ _Ben_ ,” she moaned, almost pleading, moving harder and faster. 

“Show me,” he gasped, his head falling forward to rest against her collarbone, “show me how to touch you, Rey—” 

She took his hand and brought it between her legs, directing him to the little nub just above where they were joined. The first touch of his fingers made her gasp and clench around him, and their hands trembled together as he rubbed at her.

Ben’s thrusts quickened, matching Rey’s increasingly frantic pace— and, oh, _yes_ , there it was, pleasure building at the base of her spine, stoked higher and higher by the snap of his hips against hers, the drag of her nipples against his chest, the slight roughness of his fingers on her sex— 

—and as the world burst into white light around her, she clung to him, biting into his shoulder to muffle her scream. 

He thrust once more, hard—and _now_ he clutched her to him as he spilled into her, groaning long and loud into her neck.

The world felt pleasantly far away, even after their breathing had calmed and their hearts had stopped racing. Ben’s arms relaxed around her, but didn’t fall away, even as he sighed into her skin and moved to lie back on the mattress. Rey felt utterly boneless, and she didn’t resist as he drew her down to lie beside him, tucking her into his side.

Where before she and Ben had circled each other with equal parts desire and hesitance, now Rey felt as though every moment between them was strung tight with a new, sweeter sort of tension—with the thrill of being wanted, the anticipation of learning how to undo him with her mouth and hands and skin.

Ben, true to his word, seemed to feel it just as much as she did. He took any excuse he could to touch her: a casual brush of hands over dinner, a kiss to her forehead or temple as they bent over a book, a quick, passionate fumble in a shadowed corner. Also, more often than not, their spars now ended with them locked in close quarters after brawling to a standstill, glaive and broadsword alike lying discarded on the deck. 

“Yield,” Ben murmured during one such instance, when he had backed her up against the mainmast with both her wrists pinned above her head. 

His voice had gone impossibly low and husky, and Rey was caught off-guard at how her head reeled and her thighs clenched in response. “No.” 

Up on the quarterdeck, Kuruk arched an eyebrow. “Is this a fight or foreplay?”

“Why not both?” Cato laughed. 

Vicrul made a vague noise of agreement. “Maybe there’s hope for him yet.”

The Knights’ commentary was not particularly discreet, but neither Ben nor Rey were paying much attention anyway. She swayed fractionally closer, her leg brushing against the growing bulge in his trousers, and with a half-smothered growl, he surged forward to capture her mouth. 

“Holy shit,” Ushar blurted.

Ap’lek punched the air, and a stiff breeze obligingly sprang up to rustle the sails. “At _fucking_ last!”

Trudgen slapped his knee, ignoring the dirty looks the other Knights sent him at the accompanying thunderclap. “Ren’s all grown up!”

And the nights— _oh_ , the nights—

Their nights were long and languorous, limned in starlight and lamplight. Ben was as inexperienced as Rey was—he had haltingly confessed as much, as they lay beside each other after that first time—but he proved to be as diligent in bed as he was at his books. He touched her carefully, almost reverently, breathing sweet words into her skin. She couldn’t always make them out, but the adoration in his voice made her heart swell even as it set her body alight.

Rey had never known that she— that _anyone_ could feel this way, outside of stories and songs. It was incredible—so much so that no matter how many times she woke in Ben’s arms, some part of her still expected to find a cold, empty bed whenever she opened her eyes. That was why, one night as they lay sated and drowsy, her fingers carding lazily through his dark hair, she whispered, “I dreamed of you.”

Ben raised his head from where it had been pillowed on her breast and looked at her questioningly.

“I’ve been seeing you in my dreams ever since I was a little girl. That’s how I knew your name. And why I looked for you all those years.”

He blinked as he processed her words. Then he _smirked_ , and Rey was entranced by the rare show of playfulness. “So I’m the man of your dreams?” 

She scoffed, the effect somewhat dulled by the fond twist of her mouth. “Oh, that’s just _awful_ —”

Ben chuckled. “Sorry, sunshine, couldn’t resist.” He shifted atop her so he could kiss the tip of her nose. 

Rey arched up against him so she could catch his lips with her own, holding him in place with the hand still buried in his hair. 

They kissed, and they laughed as they kissed—the quiet, disbelieving laughter of two people who couldn’t quite believe their eyes, who were drunk on the sex and the sweat and the nameless warmth that hung in the air around them. 

Eventually, Ben pulled away, nuzzling along the line of her jaw, down her neck, and lower still until he returned to her breasts. “Does this”—he kissed a nipple and, when she shivered, glanced up at her from beneath his eyelashes—“feel like a dream?”

 _Yes_ , was Rey’s last coherent thought as Ben took her nipple into his mouth and set to work in earnest, _the sweetest dream, don’t let me wake, please, please_ — 

##  **🌀**

But all dreams, good or bad, had to end, and this one ended with a whisper, one early morning.

"I wish you could stay," Ben whispered against her shoulder.

Rey froze, then rolled over to face him. “What?” 

“Stay with me,” he repeated, his eyes intense on hers. “Please.” 

She stared at him, a single tear slipping down her cheek. “Don’t do this, Ben. Please don’t—” 

This seemed to make him desperate, his next words tumbling out in haste. “I’ll find some god or wizard or sorcerer who can make you immortal. The seas will obey your every whim. You’ll never want for anything, I swear it.”

"Ben, I can't," she whispered. "This can't last."

He stared at her with wounded eyes. _"Why?"_

"It—" She shook her head and sat up. She took the blanket with her as she pulled away from him, wrapping it around herself. "It just _can't_."

Ben sat up too, refusing to give up. "We won't break the curse in time and then you'll—" His fists clenched in the sheets, and he swallowed hard, his eyes dangerously bright. "I can't go home. And I think you know you can't either."

"Yes, we can! _You_ can!"

"No," he said somberly. "You know the truth—what really happened to your parents. You've always known, haven't you?"

A long, painful silence. Then, barely above a whisper: "They're not coming back."

"You can't keep waiting for them, taking every step with them in the back of your mind." He shook his head. "That's no life."

"And neither is this!" she cried. "You _hate_ this ship, you hate being immortal. Or have you forgotten that I saw you weep for your parents?"

Ben flinched, but now it was Rey who was too impassioned to stop. “I'm not giving up. Let me go, Ben. I _will_ keep searching, and I’ll have more luck not tied to the _Silencer_.” 

She stood and began to dress, studiously not looking at the bed. The cabin was silent, save for the rustling of fabric and Ben’s thick, ragged breathing. 

It was only when she was dressed and about to leave that she looked back over her shoulder. Ben still sat up in the bed as though frozen, head hanging down and hair curtaining his face. 

“It’s better this way,” she said—softly, almost apologetically. “You’ll see.”

The door clicked quietly shut behind her, and Rey went topside as quickly as she could—not quite at a run, but very near it. 

She marched around the ship like a woman on a mission, eventually finding a dilapidated longboat in the depths of the hold. She promptly set about repairing it, ignoring the Knights’ silent stares and pointed comments alike. 

"Trouble in paradise?" Ushar asked.

"None of your business," Rey replied curtly, not looking up from the wood of the boat.

The lightning spirit shrugged, already walking away. “Fine. No skin off my back.” 

It took a day or two for Rey to repair the longboat, and when she had finished, she stood looking at it with her tools in hand. She bit her lip, warring with herself for a moment, then made the climb from the hold to Ben’s cabin. 

She knocked on the door, resisting the urge to fidget nervously as she waited for him to answer. When she heard no sound from within, she shook her head once, as if to clear it, and let herself in anyway. 

Ben sat at his desk, his profile just barely visible against the windows. She sensed, rather than saw, him look up at her as she entered. Rey hesitated by the door one last time, then strode over to him with quick, decisive steps. 

“Rey—” 

She kissed him hard, pulling away after only a few seconds. “Don’t speak,” she whispered against his lips, before kissing him again. _Don’t make this harder._

After a beat, he returned her kiss with desperate fervor, hands going to her hips and tugging her down onto his lap. 

There was an edge of desperation in the way he touched her—the way they touched each other. Ben broke away from Rey’s mouth and kissed down her neck, sucking bruises into the soft skin and soothing them with his tongue. Rey moaned, her head falling back to grant him more access. Her fingers twisted into his hair, pushing at his head, and he groaned against her skin at the tug in his scalp. She ground down on his lap, on the rising hardness she felt there. 

He muffled a curse into her neck, and she shivered at the faint scrape of his teeth. “Fuck me, Ben. _Please._ ” She hadn’t meant for it to slip out, but she felt too far gone to regret it much. 

Without breaking the kiss, he picked her up and carried her to his bed, Rey’s legs wrapping around his waist as he stood. Her back hit the mattress, and he pulled away to simply _look_ at her for a minute. Even in the dim light, she saw his jaw clench, and Rey pulled him to her and kissed him hard, not wanting to see the plaintive look in his eyes. 

She’d asked him to fuck her, and he did. 

Ben practically tore her clothes off, pressing hard, lingering kisses against every inch of her skin. He lingered at her breasts, suckling and nibbling at them for what felt like hours, until she pulled at his hair once more, urging his head downward. Then he kissed a steady trail down her belly, and Rey shivered as he pressed his face against her core, just breathing her in. 

“Ben—” 

He looked up at her, and she saw his eyes glitter in the darkness before he pushed her legs apart, his hands as unyielding as iron around her thighs. Then he lowered his mouth to her, kissing and licking with single-minded intensity. She was lost in sensation, only vaguely aware of her own high, breathless moans, of pinching and plucking at her own nipples as she bucked frantically against his mouth.

Rey came apart with a sharp cry, yanking _hard_ on Ben’s hair—

—but he didn’t pull away, didn’t stop, and she felt the pleasure rising inside her again, higher, _higher_ —

He moaned against her, the sound vibrating through her core—and that was when the pleasure broke over her like a wave, her spine arching with it, and if she’d had the breath she might have screamed. 

As she collapsed back onto the bed, breathless and trembling, Ben pulled away and kissed his way back up her body—thighs, belly, the valley between her breasts, the crook of her neck. His mouth was wet with her, but the kisses were soft brushes of his lips, meant to soothe rather than inflame, and Rey shivered at the contrast. 

“Inside me,” she gasped, aching and empty, “please, Ben, _please_ —” 

In this, as in everything, he obliged, sheathing himself in her with a single thrust. Then, almost before she could get her breath back, he started moving, deep, frantic thrusts that had her lips parting on hoarse, near-soundless screams. 

A drop landed on Rey’s cheek, running a slow path down to her jaw, and in the darkness she couldn’t tell if it was sweat or a tear. “Please,” Ben breathed, low and ragged. 

As though her body had learned to surrender itself to his will, she climaxed a third time, her legs clenching around his waist. Then it took only one or two more thrusts for him to follow her, his fingers digging into her hips hard enough to bruise. 

Neither of them slept that night, at most slipping into an exhausted half-doze inbetween bouts of desperate, frenzied sex, any and every way they could think of. 

“I love you,” Ben whispered brokenly into her neck just before dawn. 

Even muffled by her skin, Rey could hear the truth of it in his voice. “I know,” she answered, closing her eyes as a tear slid down her temple into her hair. 

🌀

Ben woke to a cold, empty bed. 

He allowed himself only a brief moment to drop his head into his hands and pull at his hair, to focus on that small sting rather than the sharp stabbing somewhere beneath his ribs. Then he dressed and went topside with heavy, mechanical motions—already knowing what he would find, trying to delay the reality of it as long as possible.

In the distance, just about to disappear from view, a single longboat rowed away from the _Silencer_.

Trudgen glanced at him. “Should we go after her?” 

“No,” he said, faintly amazed that he had the breath to speak. “Let her go.” _I can’t make her stay._

“Sink her boat, then?” Ushar suggested. 

A flicker of anger at her cavalier tone flared within him, but even that vanished as quickly as it had appeared, buried beneath the heartbreak. “You will not harm her.”

He knew the Knights were staring, _judging_ , and he didn’t care. 

At last, Vicrul said, “You know, Ren, for all Snoke bragged about taking your soul… perhaps he never did. Not really.” 

Ben huffed mirthlessly. “I do believe that’s the kindest thing you’ve ever said to me.” 

“Yeah, well, strange times.” Vicrul shrugged. “Don’t get used to it.” 

##  **🌀**

The fog around the _Silencer_ swirled and shifted, and Rey braced herself for what horrors she might now see. 

She saw the common room of a seedy tavern, dimly lit by a pitiful fire. A small family—a disheveled man, an equally slatternly woman, and a fresh-faced young girl, her dark hair in three little buns—sat at a table littered with stained playing cards and bottles of cheap liquor, and across from them sat Unkar Plutt. 

The man took a slug of liquor, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “You cleaned me out, you bastard,” he slurred. “I have _nothing._ ” He smashed his empty tankard on the floor, and the girl flinched at the noise. 

It was as if the tiny movement reminded him of his daughter’s existence. His gaze lit on her, and he said, as if seized by a sudden inspiration, “Unless you want the girl.” 

“I have no use for a sniveling brat,” Plutt sneered. 

“You’re a good girl, aren’t you, little one?” the woman cooed, sickly sweet. 

“Yes, Mama,” the girl lisped, her voice faintly troubled. 

“You can work hard, can’t you?” said the man. 

“Yes, Papa.”

The man turned back to Plutt. “There, you see? One new cabin girl for the _Niima_.” 

“S’pose it’ll have to do.” Plutt grabbed the little one’s wrist. “Come along, girl.”

She looked back and forth between the couple and Plutt. “Mama? Papa?”

The man tried to smile reassuringly, but it was closer to a gruesome death’s head smile than anything. “Just go with Mister Plutt, now, there’s a good girl. He’ll look after you for a while.” 

She tried to pull away, her voice starting to rise with distress. “No. Wanna stay with you.”

The woman touched the girl’s cheek, briefly and perfunctorily. “We’ll come back for you, sweetheart.” 

Plutt stomped away, dragging the little girl behind him. The couple walked off in the other direction, growing more distant and blurred as she screamed, high and childish, “No! Come back! Please!” 

Then she saw the same couple—not quite skeletons, but so gaunt and wasted that they might as well have been—in a small, squalid room. The man was slumped in a rickety chair, and a half-empty bottle of liquor dangled from his limp hand, tilted enough to be trickling out onto the earthen floor. The woman lay on a bare mattress, her hand dangling off the edge and her shift stained with vomit and blood. 

Both their eyes were wide and useeing, their mouths gaping grotesquely. 

And then, Ben’s voice, smooth and deep, rumbling like thunder: _“You’ve always known, haven’t you?”_

Her own choked, teary reply: _“They’re not coming back.”_

The scene faded, and out of the darkness and swirling clouds and fog rose a chorus of voices: 

Hux, nasally, distorted and unnaturally loud: _“A pet mongrel is still a mongrel… performing tricks for attention.”_

The haughtier palace servants, all the snide things they whispered when they thought she couldn’t hear: _Orphan._

_Poor girl._

_Pitiful._

A sailor on the _Sunspear_ , muttered resentfully: _“She has everything a maid of nineteen could want, yet looks to the horizon still. Is it not enough?”_

_Sea-touched._

_Mad._

Tears streamed down Rey’s face, and her chest ached with sobs. Still she rowed, tightening her grip on the oars until her fingers were numb and covered in splinters, trying to ground herself with the feel of the rough wood in her hands. 

Then, suddenly, there was a sort of _snap_ in the air—as if some great, invisible barrier that was being stretched ever thinner had finally torn. All at once, the darkness and clouds and fog faded, replaced by clear blue water and cloudless sky. 

Panting, Rey tried to go on. Her head swam and her eyelids fluttered, until she crumpled to the floor of the longboat, hands still clenched around the oars.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you liked this, please don't forget to leave a comment or a kudos, or come say hi on [twitter](twitter.com/niennathegrey) or [tumblr](niennathegrey.tumblr.com). Thanks for reading!


	9. Chapter 9

She woke to Rose’s worried face hovering over her. “Wha…” 

“Oh, thank the gods!” Rose gave Rey a quick hug, then pulled back to call, “Finn! Finn, she’s awake!” 

“ _Rey!_ ” Finn scooted closer, a smile of relief on his face. “Oh, it’s so good to see you!” 

Her throat was as sore as if she’d been screaming for hours. Maybe she had been. Rey tried to say how glad she was to see them, to say something, _anything_ , but all that came out was a hoarse croak. 

“Hey, hey, shhh.” Rose gently propped her up and held a waterskin to her lips. “Not too fast.”

The water was warm and tasted rather stale, but just then it may as well have been the finest nectar. “Where are we going?” Rey asked, wincing at the rasp in her voice. 

Finn smiled wider. “Home, of course! Back to Alderaan.” 

So her dream on the _Silencer_ had been true after all. Even as exhausted as she was, the realization warmed her from the inside out. 

Then she thought of Ben, and the curse, and Leia’s hope—faded but steady—that he would still be found one day. 

Leia had to know how much her son missed her. 

Rey had to tell her.

When they returned to the castle, Rose and Finn rushed her inside, calling for a healer. A baffled Mistress Kalonia noted that there was nothing wrong with Rey but exhaustion—no dehydration, no sunburn, _none_ of the maladies one would expect from someone lost at sea. 

Leia and Han rushed to the infirmary as soon as they heard, and found Rey sitting up in bed, reclining against some pillows. As the door swung open, she turned to them with a wan smile. “Well, I’m back.”

Leia closed her eyes in relief, pressing a hand to her chest. 

Han raised a hand and nodded, eyes suspiciously bright. “Hey, kid.” 

Opening her eyes, Leia marched over to the bed and pulled Rey into a fierce hug. “Thank the gods you’re safe, Rey.” 

Rey returned the embrace, arms tight around the older woman’s shoulders. A single tear slipped down her cheek, and she huffed wetly. She’d half expected her tears to have run dry by now—she must have cried more these past few weeks than she had in the rest of her life. “I have so much to tell you.” 

“Hush, now.” Leia pulled back and touched her cheek. “It can wait until you’ve had some rest.” 

“This can’t.” Rey shook her head, grasping the older woman’s hand and looking into her eyes intently. “Ben is alive.”

Leia stared back at her, flabbergasted. She and Han turned to look at each other, clearly concerned, then back at Rey. “Excuse me?” she ventured cautiously.

Han attempted his trademark humor, but it rang a little hollow at the edges. “Kid, you didn’t drink any seawater, did you?” Leia glared at him, and he raised his hands in surrender. 

“That’s how I survived the wreck. Ben saved me and brought me aboard his ship. The—” Rey paused, bracing herself for the disbelief she knew would follow. “The _Silencer_.” 

Han’s jaw dropped open, while a deep furrow appeared in Leia’s brow. “Rey…”

Rey spoke quickly, desperately. “I know it’s supposed to be an old sailors’ tale, I thought so too, but it’s not. Ben saved me, he—” She faltered, remembering large, gentle hands and a deep, soft voice vowing “ _you’re not alone._ ” 

“He took care of me,” she finished in a whisper. 

She met Leia’s eyes again, and seeing the wariness there, tightened her grip on the queen’s hand. “Please, please believe me, _please_ —” 

“Shhh, it’s all right, Rey.” Leia patted her hand. “You’ve been through an ordeal.” 

This, Rey thought, must have been what it was like to have a mother chase your nightmares away. Under any other circumstances, she might have let herself be comforted. Now, however, she let out a hoarse, frustrated cry. Flinging herself away from Leia, she drew herself up as best she could. “I’m not mad!” 

“Hey, easy, kid.” Now Han approached, his hand outstretched. Clearly, he meant to calm her down, but part of Rey wondered sardonically if he were trying to defend himself from her. “We never said that.”

“You don’t have to! It’s all over your faces!” 

“Rey, please try to understand.” Leia’s mouth trembled at the corners, her eyes beginning to shine with frustrated tears. “You know how much I— _we_ — miss Ben, but ghost ships and sailors’ tales? Can you _hear_ yourself?” 

“It’s the truth!” Rey turned from one to the other, biting her lip. “I wouldn’t lie about this!” 

The queen didn’t _frown_ , exactly, but the lines of her face tightened, and her face grew indescribably more severe. “That’s enough, Rey.” She drew back. “You’re getting over-excited. You need rest to get your strength back.”

The quiet click of the infirmary door closing was unnaturally loud in Rey’s ears. She stared after the royal couple, a shaking hand rising to her mouth.

She had come home—to what? 

##  **🌀**

“Ben is alive,” Rey repeated when they came back the next day to check on her. “He’s cursed to be captain of the _Silencer_ now, and he’s _trapped_ there. He misses you”—she looked from Leia to Han—“both of you, so much. I have to help him find his soul so he can come home.” 

Leia’s face turned tight and severe again, while Han roughly scrubbed a hand down his face and over his jaw.

“Can I sail again?” asked Rey. 

“Absolutely not,” Leia answered immediately. 

“But you heard Mistress Kalonia, she just said I was better!”

Leia folded her arms, looking at Rey with maternal sternness. “I strongly suspect that was only because you never mentioned the _Silencer_ within earshot of her.”

“You just came back from a shipwreck and you want to run right towards another one?” added Han. “You got lucky _twice_ , kid”—he held up two fingers and shook them in Rey’s face—“let’s not tempt fate a third time, huh?”

“Ben loves reading and would have been a scholar if he could.” Rey spoke with certainty, her words coming faster and surer as more memories of her time on the _Silencer_ rose to the surface. “He hates all those stuffy court dances, but he’s really good at them. He said not to tell Master Threepio. He—” She paused briefly, then continued in a rush, “He has dimples when he smiles.” 

She stared at the royal couple in challenge. “Am I or am I not talking about your son? If you care about me— about _him_ , you’ll let me go!” 

Then she turned wide, desperately hopeful eyes on Han. “Han, you believe me, don’t you?” 

He sighed explosively, looking at her with an old sadness. “Kid, I wish I could. I really do.”

“Rey,” Leia said firmly, “you are not to set foot on another ship, or skiff, or longboat, until you are perfectly rested and recovered.” 

Later that afternoon, Finn and Rose came to see her, and with Mistress Kalonia’s permission, they took Rey for a walk in the gardens. 

She’d always loved the gardens, having never seen so much _green_ before, but now Rey walked through them unseeing. “I don’t need minders,” she said. “I’m not an invalid.” 

Finn frowned. “Hey, no one said that.”

Rey scoffed. “People _don’t say_ a lot of things. It’s really what they _do_ , isn’t it?” She glared at Finn, and he raised his hands placatingly.

“Rey, you’re not being very fair to us here,” Rose chimed in, frowning. “We were really worried about you, you know. We just want to make sure you’re okay.” 

Rey sighed and gave Rose a contrite look. “I know. It’s just… do _you_ think I’m mad, Rose?” When the other woman hesitated, Rey looked at Finn. “Finn?”

“No,” he said, after a long pause. 

“Thanks for the support.” 

“I think,” Rose said slowly, “you definitely went through _something_ out there, and it’s going to take some time to get used to being home—to being safe again.” 

“You found me in a _longboat_ , remember? Where else would I get one if not from a ship?”

“You could have washed up on a deserted island somewhere and made one,” Finn offered. 

Rey snorted. “I’m good, but not _that_ good.” 

“Besides, if you had, it would probably have been a raft,” Rose pointed out. 

Rey raised a hand in her direction. “Yes, thank you!”

Finn stared incredulously at Rose. “Whose side are you on anyway?” Turning back to Rey, he asked, “Are you sure you didn’t just find the boat drifting from the wreck of the _Sunspear_ , and haven’t been rowing back to Alderaan all this time?” 

Rey nearly growled in annoyance. “No! Firstly, it would have been in _worse_ condition if it came from the _Sunspear,_ and secondly, how would I have survived with no provisions for—” She paused. “Wait, how long _was_ I gone?” 

“Nearly two moons,” said Rose. 

“How long is it till the winter solstice?”

There was a pause as all three of them tried to count the days. “Uh, the day after tomorrow,” Finn concluded. He looked at Rey warily. “Why?” 

Maz’s words came back to her in a rush, and Rey’s eyes widened. “Oh, gods. I have to break the curse by then, _I have to go—_ ” 

Finn tried again, with a touch of desperation, “Are you sure someone didn’t find you after you washed up somewhere, and you… maybe… just imagined the bits about magic?” 

Rey opened her mouth to answer—then gasped and doubled over.

The afternoon sun shone down on the gardens, but Rey only felt cold—so deep and penetrating that it _burned._ Her breath rushed out of her lungs and her fingers scrabbled blindly—at the grass, the hem of her tunic, _anything_ —as the infernal cold crept through her limbs. She looked down at herself through blurry eyes, but found nothing there—no rime of frost coating her legs, no black frostbite on her fingers.

Then warmth, soft and gentle as the shallows just beyond shore, swept through her. It soothed, but could not banish, the cold entirely—and the cold settled into her, deeper than bone or blood, lurking like a shark just below the waves. 

_I can only slow it, not stop it entirely_ , Maz had said—and now the curse had caught up. 

She was distantly aware of Rose and Finn helping her stand, rushing her inside, calling for Mistress Kalonia. As they moved down a hallway, they passed a lone portrait draped in black. 

Rey had always known it was of the lost prince, but now she needed to see it—to make _them_ see. “Wait.” As Rose and Finn stared at her in confusion, she tugged the black cloth off the frame with a shaking hand. 

A young Ben Solo stared at her from the canvas—the same dark, soulful eyes set in a teenage boy’s unscarred face. 

“Look,” she said softly. “ _He_ found me.” 

Behind her back, Finn and Rose exchanged worried glances.

Mistress Kalonia still could find nothing wrong with Rey, but prescribed potions and tonics and poultices anyway. Rey smiled and accepted them, as well as the thick blankets and steaming cups of tea, and pretended that they worked—that there was no deathly chill throbbing somewhere deep inside her, occasionally sharpening enough to make her wince and go rigid against the pain, that the warmth of Maz’s magic wasn’t fading more and more with every hour. 

But Leia was not fooled, and the queen walked around the castle that day with haunted eyes. “Maybe there _is_ a curse on our family after all.” 

Han raised an eyebrow. “Thought you didn’t believe in all that.” 

“I don’t. But first Ben, then Luke, and now Rey…” Leia sighed, a decade’s worth of grief in the sound. “The sea has never been kind to our family, has it?” 

##  **🌀**

The day Rey left, Ben stood at the forecastle, heedless of the driving rain, the near-ceaseless crack of thunder, the Knights’ wary eyes on his unmoving form. 

_“I should have left you where you were,”_ he’d told her once. He’d meant it for her sake, but now he wondered if perhaps he hadn’t been speaking about himself too. Not even the loss of his soul compared to this—the prospect of interminable, lonely years on the _Silencer,_ a yawning abyss made all the bleaker and colder by the brief contrast of Rey’s light and warmth. 

“You’re pathetic, you know that?” said Cato.

 _“Leave._ ” Ben’s voice was dangerously even, as if he were only a word or two away from screaming. 

“You could’ve chased her, made her stay, but you didn’t. Now you stand here moping like a lovesick fool—”

In one savage motion, Ben whirled around and punched Cato square in the nose. “I. Said. Leave.”

The water spirit did so, but not before spitting at his feet with a look of mingled contempt and pity.

 _Weak,_ Ben chastised himself as he turned back to face the tempestuous ocean. 

_Foolish._

_Not enough. Never enough._

_Monster._

He howled into the wind and the rain.

The night was little better. There was nowhere on the ship he could go without being reminded of her, so with no other recourse, he slept. But Ben found no rest here either, because he dreamed of Rey: of her hazel eyes, alight with wonder— of her exhilarated smile, lit gold by the sunset, as they sparred— of her soft skin against his and her breathy moans as she came apart above, beneath, all around him. They were so clear, felt so _real_ , that he woke hoping she would be beside him.

When she was not, he buried his face in the pillow with a strangled sob. 

The next day, Ben emerged from his cabin and demanded a spar with the Knights. 

“Oh, _now_ you want our help?” Cato grumbled. 

“You actually _want_ your ass kicked even more?” Trudgen asked. 

Ap’lek folded her arms. “No way. In your state”—she glanced pointedly at his disheveled hair and rumpled clothes—“it would be like kicking a drowned puppy.” 

“A particularly pathetic drowned puppy,” added Kuruk. 

Ben turned on him, a waterspout rising threateningly from the ocean. “Say that again.” 

Ushar leaped up with a savage grin. “All right, you asked for it, lover boy.” Lightning poured forth from her hands, and Ben dodged and weaved through the storm as the other Knights joined the fray.

They sparred so long and so fiercely that the Knights tired before Ben did, and the resulting storm was so savage and stretched so far over the sea that no ship was safe.

But not even this was enough to stop the dreams, and on the third day Ben shut himself back in his cabin. The locked door and the noise of the storm did little to muffle the violent crashes and bangs from inside, and all six Knights looked askance. 

“You were wrong, Ap’lek,” said Vicrul. “ _This_ is the most miserable we’ve ever seen him.” 

“Yeah, we’ll never be dry again.” Trudgen lifted his arm, grimacing in distaste at his sodden sleeve. 

Two things happened, then. 

First, the noises from within the cabin stopped—abruptly. 

Second, the storm began to dissipate. 

The Knights looked from the Great Cabin to the slowly clearing sky and back again. “What is it now?” 

By unspoken agreement, Vicrul and Ap’lek approached Ben’s cabin. 

“Ren?” Vicrul knocked on the door. “Are you in there?” 

“Had enough of getting the shit beat out of you, then?” When there was no response for a good minute or two, Ap’lek began pounding on the door. “ _Ren!_ Open up, damn it!” 

“We tire of these childish tantrums,” Vicrul added, deadly calm. 

When there was still no answer, the pair exchanged a glance, and Ap’lek blasted the door off its hinges with a gale-force wind. They entered the cabin—and lo and behold, Ben lay crumpled on the floor amid the ruin of his library, looking for all the world like he had just dropped where he stood. 

Ap’lek’s jaw dropped. “What the _fuck_?”

“What the hell’s wrong with him?” 

As they drew closer, they saw that he was flushed and sweating. When Ap’lek leaned over him to awkwardly touch his forehead, she immediately drew back with a hiss. “Gods, he’s burning up!”

“What? But our kind don’t _get_ sick—” Vicrul glanced back at her, and understanding dawned on both their faces.

“All right. Fine,” Vicrul said, clearly trying to stay calm. “Let’s just— make him comfortable. D’you think we can get him to his bed, at least?”

Storm spirits though they were, Ben was still a tall, broad, dead weight of a man, and Ap’lek huffed with effort and annoyance. “Right, enough of this.” She waved a hand, and a wind swirled around Ben, making it easier for them to trundle him into his sleeping quarters and unceremoniously drop him on the unmade bed. 

“Call the others in,” said Vicrul. “We’ll figure out what to do with him.” 

“Isn’t it obvious?” said Kuruk, after the Knights had crowded into the cabin and stared, dumbfounded, at the still form in the bed. “He’s mortal again.” 

Cato’s brow furrowed. “How?” 

“Like he said, isn’t it obvious?” Ap’lek rolled her eyes at the men. “It’s the girl, you idiots. It’s always been her, hasn’t it?” 

Vicrul’s eyes widened with realization. “She and Ren have been breaking the terms of Snoke’s curse. One by one, ever since he brought her aboard.” 

“So can he leave?” Trudgen looked around the cabin. “Can _we_?” 

“Why don’t you go find out?” Ushar snapped, arms folded tightly across her chest. 

“Fine.” Trudgen elbowed Vicrul. “Spot me, will you?” 

They left the cabin, and the others flocked to the windows in anticipation and curiosity. Vicrul watched from the deck as Trudgen rose into the air and flew as far away from the ship as he could. He didn’t get very far before he jerked in midair, as if stung, and fluttered haltingly back to the ship. 

The Knights heard—and felt—the thud as he dropped onto the deck, and before long, the pair appeared in the cabin doorway again, Vicrul propping Trudgen up with visible effort. 

Cato arched an eyebrow. “Clearly, the answer is no.” 

“Yeah, no shit,” Trudgen hissed as Vicrul dumped him on a nearby seat. 

“It’s a perfect curse,” Ap’lek realized, with a sort of horrified awe. “Ren might have gotten his soul back, but it won’t matter much if he’s trapped here anyway.” 

Kuruk whistled lowly as he eyed Ben’s prone form. “Snoke must have really hated him.” He shook his head. “Poor bastard. I almost feel sorry for him.” They all looked skeptically at him, and he repeated, “I said _almost._ ” 

A flicker of movement drew the Knights’ attention. Ben was too weak to rise from the bed, but he stirred as if he were trying to anyway. His eyes moved restlessly under his closed lids, and he murmured something, unintelligible except for one hoarse, broken word: “... sunshine…” 

The Knights exchanged glances, and then, as one, looked down at him again with something like pity on their faces. 

🌀

An ocean away, Rey snapped awake with a gasp. “ _Ben!_ ”

Tears streamed down her face, and she felt like she couldn’t breathe—both from the stygian cold of the curse seeping through her body, and from the force of her own emotions. _It’s not over yet, he’s_ dying _, no,_ Ben _—_

“Let me out,” she sobbed. “ _Let me out!_ ” 

The cry echoed through the empty, moonlit halls of the palace.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you liked this, please don't forget to leave a comment or kudos, or come say hi on [twitter](twitter.com/niennathegrey) or [tumblr](niennathegrey.tumblr.com). Thanks for reading!


	10. Chapter 10

Had she had the strength, Rey would have been pacing the floor of her room. As it was, she could only lie in bed, staring unseeingly at the canopy above her head as her thoughts raced. 

Ben couldn’t die. He just _couldn’t_. 

She had to bring him home—for Leia and Han, yes, but for _himself_ too. The night the mermaids sang and he’d told her about his family—the night she’d promised to help him—he’d looked so… _lost_ , and even as she reached out to comfort him, a part of her had not understood. _Do you really not see?_ she’d thought, as she traced his scar and he looked at her like she was everything. _They want you home. How could they not?_

He’d called himself a monster—but, oh, what monster would be so gentle to a lost, lonely girl, would soothe her through her nightmares, would hold her like he wanted to keep her safe? 

They would want him home—because _she_ wanted him home.

Rey wanted to _know_ Ben, without the threat of a vengeful god’s curse hanging over their heads. She wanted to watch him trade barbs with Leia and hide a smile, even as he rolled his eyes, at Han’s quips. She wanted to see him meet Finn and Rose and gain their approval little by little. She wanted to read a thousand thousand more books with him in the library and debate over each and every one. She wanted to sneak out of stuffy court balls with him and dance on the terrace or in the garden, to their own rhythm and away from the court’s prying, judging eyes. She wanted to hear him laugh again, to memorize the lines around his mouth and eyes when he smiled. 

How could they know him and not—

_Oh._

Rey froze. Then she sobbed into the darkness and the silence, “I’ve been so blind.” 

As if in agreement, or mockery, the cold throbbed in her bones. 

_I never told him._

She had to go back. 

_Sunshine_ , he’d whispered as he lay alone and helpless. 

He’d called out to her, and she’d promised to help him. She had to go back, if— if only to—

 _No._ Rey shook her head sharply and pushed the covers back. No, she wouldn’t even _think_ it. She would go back for Ben and bring him home even if she had to fight Snoke himself. 

She pulled on a thick robe and grabbed the iron poker for the fireplace with numbed, clumsy fingers—and suddenly, the enormity of what she was doing hit her. 

She was a girl with a stick, cursed from beyond the grave by an eldritch sea god, running off towards a ghost ship to save a lost prince.

The Rey of two moons ago would have scoffed and told her to lay off Snap’s questionable grog. 

But this Rey—the Rey who had spoken with a mermaid, had tamed sea serpents and storm gods alike—remembered Ben, his soft, deep voice and his gentle hands— saw him burning coal-hot in his lonely bed, calling out to her with the last of his strength— and she knew she had to go. 

##  **🌀**

Leia had had the foresight to have the windows locked, but what was that to a determined Rey armed with a handful of hairpins? 

In short order, the windows stood open, and Rey climbed to the ground on a rope made of her twisted and knotted blankets. By now, her limbs were barely cooperating, and each attempt to move was agony—but she pushed through anyway, gritting her teeth against the pain. 

“You’re really doing it, then.” 

Rey whirled around at the familiar voice—or tried to, and instead ended up staggering against the wall. Rose stepped into view, and Rey saw disapproval, concern, and resignation cross her friend’s face in quick succession. “You shouldn’t be out here alone.”

Rey clutched at Rose’s arm. “So you _do_ believe me?” 

The other woman studied her for a long moment, then sighed. “Honestly, I still don’t know whether I do or not. And I still think this is dangerous, no matter _why_ you’re doing it.” Seeing Rey’s mulish expression, she held up a hand. “ _But_ I also know how, well, determined you are—”

“You mean stubborn.”

Rose cracked a reluctant smile. “That too. I know you’re never going to be at peace until you find… whatever it is you’re looking for out there. And—” She bit her lip, then burst out, “And if you go and get yourself killed, I will never forgive myself—so _come back,_ you hear me?”

“Yes, ma’am.” Rey pulled her into a quick hug, shivering with cold and relief in equal measure. “Thank you, Rose.” 

They sneaked out onto the docks—but there were no longboats or skiffs or any other small boats to be seen. As Rey let out a short, frustrated scream, Rose observed, “I guess the queen knows how stubborn you are too.” 

“Need a ride?” 

Rey and Rose turned to look in the direction of the new voice. A woman’s head rose from the waves, her pale braids gleaming in the starlight. 

“Rey,” Rose said faintly, “is that— an actual mermaid?”

“ _Ahsoka_ ,” Rey breathed. 

“There’s trouble on the _Silencer._ You are needed, Storm-queen.” 

“‘Storm-queen?’” Rose repeated. 

Rey lurched forward. “Take me to him!” 

Ahsoka glanced over her shoulder to where the Leviathan’s head rose from the water. It stared at Rey with a giant, shining eye, then nudged her with its snout and gave a low, happy chitter.

“Oh, my _gods—_ ”

“We don’t have much time.” Rey shuddered and bit back a cry, and Ahsoka frowned. “Yes, we _really_ don’t have much time.” She jerked her chin at the Leviathan. “Hurry.”

Rey clambered gracelessly onto the Leviathan’s neck, gripping two of its tentacles like reins. She glanced at Rose, whose jaw opened and closed soundlessly. With a brave smile that was belied by the tremble at the corners of her mouth, Rey said, “Wish me luck.”

As the Leviathan swam away from the docks, Rey turned back and called over her shoulder, “Oh, and those sea tales we used to tell on the _Sunspear_? They’re all true!” 

The curse was now a near-constant, freezing stab within her, so sharp and agonizing that Rey could barely hold onto the Leviathan. She gritted her teeth and forced her fingers to close around the tentacles.

_I’m coming, Ben._

_Hold on._

_Please._

##  **🌀**

“Think he’ll make it?” Ap’lek asked. 

“No,” Kuruk said—matter-of-factly, but not unkindly.

Vicrul and Trudgen had been elected to watch over Ben, while the rest of the Knights stayed on deck—half to wait for either help or release, half to escape the sympathy that threatened to creep over them at the sight of Ben, still and pale. 

The pre-dawn stillness was suddenly broken by the sound of something large swimming closer to the _Silencer_ , and the Leviathan’s head came into view.

“Oh, not again—” Ushar growled, lightning crackling around her fists. 

“No, no, stop!” came a shout from above. “It’s me!”

The Knights’ jaws dropped in unison. 

The Leviathan’s neck curved over the gunwale, and Rey tumbled from its head onto the deck. “Thanks,” she panted, and the serpent rumbled happily before sinking back into the depths. 

“You’re here,” Ushar said incredulously. 

“Yeah.”

Ap’lek approached with a frown. “Ren’s in a bad way.” 

Rey closed her eyes against a fresh wave of pain. “I know. That’s… why… I came back.” She lifted her head, jaw tight with effort. “Show me.” 

“Storm-queen indeed.” Cato’s voice was reluctantly impressed, and he elbowed Kuruk. “Come on.”

As the men entered Ben’s cabin, Ushar asked, “Why’d you leave, anyway?” For once, she sounded genuinely curious, rather than sarcastic.

 _Because he asked me to stay, and I_ wanted _to, but I was afraid he’d wake up one day and see I was nothing after all._ “It’s”—Rey bit her lip—“complicated.” 

Ushar rolled her eyes. _"Mortals_.” 

The other four Knights came out of the Great Cabin, all supporting Ben. Rey was distantly aware of Ap’lek and Ushar helping her stand and hobble towards him. She sobbed as she drew closer—it was true, like all her nightmares had been true. Ben was dying, and although she had come back, it might all still be for naught. 

The Knights lowered their respective charges to the deck—Ben lay on the boards, and Rey half-sprawled, half-knelt at his side. “If you have anything to tell him,” Vicrul said somberly, “now is the time.” Then, to her surprise, they withdrew, heading towards the prow.

Rey cupped Ben’s cheek, tracing the path of his scar. His skin _burned_ against hers, fire to her ice, and she blinked hard against a fresh wave of tears. “Ben?” she whispered thickly. “It’s me. Please wake up.”

He must have heard her—he stirred, and his eyes fluttered open. They were glazed with fever, and she could see how much effort it took him to focus on her face. “Rey…?” His mouth moved, but he had neither breath nor strength to speak.

“Shhh.” Another deep, freezing stab, and Rey winced, bending nearly double. She moved to rest her forehead against his, her tears dripping onto his face. “I’m here, Ben.” 

She could feel the puffs of his labored breathing against her mouth, and it took him long moments to gasp, “Least… I get… to say goodbye.”

 _That_ broke through the haze of pain, and she pulled back to look him in the eye. “No, no, you can’t die. I won’t allow it. You told me that. Remember?” 

He huffed, nudging his head weakly against her palm. “Don’t think… it’s up to you… sunshine.” 

“The hell it isn’t!” 

Ben’s eyes were slowly sliding shut. Rey grabbed at his shoulders—but her whole body felt weak and cold and numb, and she couldn’t muster the strength to shake him. “Don’t go,” she gasped. “Please, Ben, please don’t leave me.”

A final pulse of stygian cold washed through her, stealing her breath—but not before she whispered, “I love you.”

With the last of her strength, Rey pressed her lips to Ben’s—and slumped onto his chest as the first rays of the sun peeked over the horizon. 

🌀

All was silent—and then there was a _ripple_ in the very fabric of the world.

As one, the Knights turned and hurried back to where Rey and Ben lay intertwined and unmoving on the deck. “Are they dead?” Trudgen ventured. 

As if in answer, Ben stirred and opened his eyes—clear and keen once more. 

Blinking owlishly at the six stunned faces above him, he started to raise himself on his elbows—then paused as he registered the soft, warm weight on his chest: Rey, still half-sprawled over him. 

The memory of the last few moments rushed back, and he cupped her head with a shaking hand. “Rey?” he murmured. “Can you hear me?” 

Nothing in his life had been so sweet as the relief he felt when she lifted her head—

—except the dawning realization and _joy_ in her eyes when they met his, and the radiant smile that spread across her face—

—and the deep, tender note in her voice as she whispered, _“Ben.”_

She threw her arms around him and buried her face in the crook of his neck, knocking him back to the deck in her elation. He rested a hand between her shoulder blades and turned his face into her unbound hair. _We’re alive_ , Ben thought dizzily, his emotions running too wild for speech. He thought he heard Rey sniffle into his neck, and he held her closer, nuzzling at her temple. _I’m here, sunshine. We’re all right._

They lay there for they knew not how long, just breathing each other in. 

“You came back,” Ben murmured. His lips brushed her temple as he spoke, and once more he marveled at this— this _miracle_ , of her skin warm and _alive_ against his and her arms clutching him tight. 

Rey lifted her head—rather reluctantly, even if it was so she could look him in the eye—but otherwise refused to let go. “Of course I did,” she breathed, fingers fluttering over his brow, nose, cheeks, lips—anywhere she could reach, as if to make sure he wasn’t a dream. “But what happened? When I left, you were immortal… you got your soul back while I was gone?” 

“No. I think…” Now _his_ eyes widened with realization. “ _Oh._ I see now.” 

When he continued, his voice was intent—willing her to understand. “I was getting my soul back the whole time you were on the ship.”

Rey’s brow furrowed—and then she understood. Still, she wanted— _needed_ to hear him say it aloud. “How?” she whispered. 

“It’s you, Rey.” Ben brushed a strand of hair from her face, his fingers lingering over her cheek. “You made me remember what it was like to feel— to _be_ human again. It’s always been you.”

Rey’s breath caught in her throat at the look on his face—at the utter adoration in his dark eyes, in the gentle curve of his smile. 

She could find no words for the enormity of the answering feeling in her chest—so she bent down and kissed him, pouring all her emotion into the movement of her lips against his. He returned the kiss eagerly, fingers sinking into her hair and pulling her closer.

Eventually, they had to pull apart for air, but refused to go very far, brushing their lips over the other’s again and again. 

Then Rey pulled back just enough to look into Ben’s eyes again. She smiled once more—not the brilliant grin of a few moments ago, but something smaller and more intimate, though by no means less happy. “I love you, Ben.”

In contrast, Ben’s answering smile was almost hesitant—until suddenly, it wasn’t, and Rey’s heart stuttered at both the unbridled joy on his face, and at how close she had come to never seeing it again. “And I love you, Rey.” He trailed his thumb along the line of her jaw. _“So much.”_

The sudden sound of applause and whistling made them both jolt. Slowly, they got to their feet, but refused to let go of one another, Rey clasping Ben’s hand firmly in hers. 

“Congratulations.” Ap’lek’s voice was as light as ever, but there was no condescension or teasing in her voice now. “A true fairytale ending.” 

Ben paused. Then, equally sincerely: “Thanks.” 

“The curse is broken, and we are masters of the _Silencer_ again,” Kuruk said. “Your debt is repaid, Ren.” 

Ushar cocked a hip. “It only took you _six years_ , but you delivered.” 

Cato nodded at Rey. “Or she did, but same difference, I suppose.” 

“Now it’s our turn.” Trudgen stepped back and, with a little flourish, gestured toward a longboat. “This boat is yours, with as much of Ren’s treasure as it can hold.” He shrugged. “If you still want any of it, I mean.” 

Vicrul turned to them. “Go in peace, Kylo Ren.”

Ben shook his head. “My name is Ben Solo.” 

Vicrul did not smile, but he clasped Ben’s forearm in a warrior’s salute and gave him a deep, respectful nod. “Go in peace, Ben Solo.”

Rey and Ben boarded the longboat, and the Knights lowered it into the water. Looking up at the storm spirits clustered along the gunwale, they both raised a hand in farewell. The Knights nodded in unison, and the _Silencer_ sailed away, disappearing over the horizon. 

As the sun rose higher, painting the eastern sea in gold, Rey and Ben took an oar each and began to row back to Alderaan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The use of "sunshine" as Rey's nickname in this fic was inspired by the absolutely **_incredible_** _[my wildest wind (come blow into my room)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13235982)_ by [meritmut](https://archiveofourown.org/users/meritmut/pseuds/meritmut), which you should go read immediately if you haven't already (and actually, even if you have).
> 
> The end of this chapter is actually one of the first scenes I thought of when brainstorming this story. The whole time I was writing the fic, I was excited to finally get to this scene, and now I'm even more excited that you've read it! Now there's only an epilogue left... 👀 
> 
> If you liked this, please don't forget to leave a comment or kudos, or come say hi on [twitter](https://twitter.com/niennathegrey) or [tumblr](niennathegrey.tumblr.com). Thanks for reading!


	11. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you like to listen to music while reading, I highly recommend listening to ["Ashitaka and San"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65VAXdcFlE8) from the _Princess Mononoke_ score while reading this chapter.

Leia and Han stood on the dock, watching anxiously for they knew not what—a boat? Rey? Rey in a boat? Some grand sign from the heavens? 

Lo and behold, a single longboat came into view, rowed by two figures. As it drew closer, they saw who the pair were, and—

“So it _was_ all true,” Han muttered, his voice devoid of its usual dry wit. 

Beside him, Leia raised a shaking hand to her mouth, eyes wide. 

Rey and Ben moored the boat and came ashore to stand before the royal couple. Their hands were clasped, Rey’s thumb softly stroking Ben’s knuckles. They looked exhausted, but also—oddly content. 

_Happy_ , even. 

“We’re home,” said Rey. 

Leia and Han looked back and forth between Rey and Ben—unable to believe their eyes, unable to say… anything, really. It was a rare thing that could render _both_ rulers of Alderaan totally speechless, and Rey supposed that their presumed-dead son coming back to them after a decade counted as _very rare indeed_.

Leia broke the silence first. “Ben…” she whispered, one hand half-raised—as if to touch him, to make sure this was all real. 

Ben swallowed hard, and when he spoke, his voice wavered. “Mom. Dad.”

Han strode over, clapped his son on the shoulder in the age-old show of manly emotion—then instantly pulled him into a fierce hug. “We’ve missed you, son.”

Ben stood rigid with shock for a moment. Then he let out a shuddering breath, and he sank into his father’s embrace, broad shoulders shaking with sobs. 

Rey stood a respectful distance away, watching the reunion with a gentle smile. 

Leia turned to her and grasped her hands. “Thank you, Rey,” she breathed, tears streaming down her face. She seemed about to say more, but in the end could only press Rey’s hands tightly and repeat, her voice choked by immeasurable gratitude, _“Thank you.”_

Then the queen tugged her along as she wedged herself between her husband and her son— 

—and the sailors and dock workers were treated to the rare and wonderful sight of the royal family of Alderaan, weeping quietly and holding each other like they would never let go again. 

🌀

There were, of course, things to be done now that the crown prince of Alderaan had miraculously returned—decrees to mail, disbelieving nobles to convince, legalities to smooth over—but nobody really wanted to deal with such banal things after the whirlwind of the morning.

After Rey and Ben had been whisked back into the palace, and after they had told Leia and Han all that had happened, they were finally given a moment to themselves. 

Rey sat sideways in Ben’s lap, her head resting on his shoulder and his arms wrapped around her waist. “Are you happy?”

She felt him sigh, then bend down to kiss her forehead. “Ask me again tomorrow,” he said against her skin. “I should be, but… it doesn’t feel real yet. None of it.” 

His voice was quiet and almost ashamed, and Rey craned her neck upward to press a soothing kiss to his cheek. 

“Part of me wishes I had taken something from the _Silencer_. Just to remind myself that it _was_ all real.” 

“Will this do?”

Ben, startled by Rey’s casual tone, looked at what she held up: a book, gilt-edged, bound in blue leather. “Your favorite, yeah?” 

His jaw dropped open. “How—”

“I remember how it ended with him coming home.” She drew back just enough to look into his eyes, smoothing her thumb over a tear beginning to slide down his cheek. “And now you are too.” 

Then Ben kissed her, slow and deep. “ _We_ are,” he whispered against her lips.

Rey smiled. When she spoke, her voice was low and fervent—a promise. “And now we’ll live.”

**THE END.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been living with this story in my head for close to a year now, and I can't believe it's finally out in its entirety. Thank you so much for joining me and our beloved characters on this ride. 💕
> 
> If you liked this, please don't forget to leave a comment or kudos, or come say hi on [twitter](twitter.com/niennathegrey) or [tumblr](niennathegrey.tumblr.com). 
> 
> Till next time!


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